Isabel Duncan, a scientist at the Great Ape Language Lab, doesn`t understand people, but animals she gets - especially the bonobos. Isabel feels more comfortable in their world than she`s ever felt among humans ...until she meets John Thigpen, a very married reporter who braves the ever-present animal rights protesters outside the lab to see what`s really going on inside. When an explosion rocks the lab, severely injuring Isabel and liberating the apes, John`s human interest piece turns into the story of a lifetime, one he`ll risk his career and his marriage to follow. Then a reality TV show, Ape House, featuring the missing apes debuts under mysterious circumstances, and it immediately becomes the biggest - and unlikeliest - phenomenon in the history of modern media. Ape House delivers great entertainment, but it also opens the animal world to us in ways few novels have done, securing Sara Gruen`s place as a master storyteller who allows us to see ourselves as we never have before.