The Disappearance

This brilliant classic of speculative fiction imagines the aftermath of an extraordinary global occurrence that forces Earth's men and women to exist in parallel dimensions

Like every other family, the Gaunts are devastated by the unexplained phenomenon that occurs one Tuesday afternoon in February. In an instant, every female on Earth is mysteriously transported to a different plane, forced to live apart from the males, who have been left behind. Suddenly trapped in two parallel realities—with the bonds of love, trust, sex, and stability that formed the foundation of their relationship abruptly severed—Bill and Paula Gaunt must separately reexamine who they truly are and what they are capable of as existence itself becomes a struggle in one world that descends into violence and brutality, and another that is soon plagued by famine and despair.


Originally published more than half a century ago, Philip Wylie's provocative science fiction classic remains a masterful work of intelligence and imagination. The Disappearance is a breathtaking, thought-provoking exploration of gender roles and expectations that reveals stark truths about who we are as men and women—and as the interconnected members of a fallible human race.