McGonigal's Worm

Every chordate on Earth has become sterile. Every mammal, bird, fish and reptile simply cannot reproduce, and humanity faces extinction within a generation. All except one inexplicable exception: McGonigal's Worm, a small and seemingly unimportant creature that alone retains the ability to propagate. As scientists scramble to understand the phenomenon and governments descend into chaos, the worm becomes the most valuable organism on the planet. R.A. Lafferty's 1964 novel is a darkly comic meditation on humanity's place in the natural order, wrapped in a premise as frightening as it is absurd. With his characteristic wit and insight, Lafferty examines what happens when mankind realizes it is not the center of creation, when our dominion over the animal kingdom is exposed as an accident of biology rather than divine right. The result is both a gripping speculative crisis and a wry critique of human arrogance.