While recovering from a heartbreak of his own design, reporter Joe Rasley takes on the most interesting story he's seen in a long time - even though he seems to be the only journalist on the scene who seems to find the end of the world remotely newsworthy. The year is 1977, and a particle physicist has unwittingly put together a substance that dissolves everything that comes into contact with it. He has created a universal solvent, and now confronts an unfortunate problem: what container can you put it in? Joe finds himself getting a crash course in particle physics as he joins the eccentric Dr. Kohlman, the doctor's headstrong physicist daughter Diana, and a cat named Schrodinger, as they try to find any way at all to save the world. And it doesn't hurt to find himself falling in love along the way. Solution is a clever, yet scientifically rigorous novel that explores the intersection of journalism, science and government. Set in the gritty cityscape of 1970s New York, its themes are just as relevent to the world we live in now.
