16-year-old Jaime Needham can't see anything at night, but she has a grand vision to protect the animals of the San Francisco Zoo from the people of her city.
Three years after the death of her mother, a veterinary scientist, Jaime is learning to care for Giraffes who have developed a super virus. She helps to form a similar Plan of Enrichment that saved the Bison of Golden Gate Park from extinction. In exchange for her service, Jaime is given the opportunity for a trial nightglow lens implant to restore her night vision.
21-year-old Spence, Jaime's supervisor from South Africa, is a zoologist conducting behavior research on human and animal interaction. He has constructed human compartments which selected study members will enter inside of animal enclosures for leveled interaction, according to rank.
When Spence's project is jeopardized, trouble escalates, until it is up to Jaime to act fast to get the zoo key back in safe hands, and to find her way, on her own terms.
"The study's test members had endured more than Mark Twain's 'coldest winter...a summer in San Francisco'; they'd braved a trial fifteen-minute stay in the cold enclosures of lions, tigers, bears, elephants, monkeys, and zebras."
