There may be nowhere to go during the Automatic Age. The autovolts have swept the earth clean of most of its human inhabitants and Kerion fears that his son will grow up a lonely anomaly on an earth free of people. Time is running out for Kerion: the prosthetics that keep him alive are breaking down. What will happen if his son Barry must grow up alone? A group of survivors calling themselves The Last People are Kerions last hope. They may be able to lead them to the Delta City, a fabled refuge for humankind, free of the technologies that are trying to kill them. But is it better to risk isolation or leave his son with a group of religious fanatics? The truth will send Kerion and Barry on the run in a fight for survival beneath the sea of stars others called THE BACKBONE OF NIGHT.