The First Century After Beatrice: A Novel by Amin Maalouf

What would happen if a drug could guarantee the birth of male children? The First Century After Beatrice chronicles the events following the development of just such a chemical. The female birth rate drops as the use of the drug spreads, at first clandestinely, from the turn of the 21st century. Women are sold on the black market and men despair facing a future without them. Meanwhile, governments use the drug as a weapon for ethnic cleansing, threatening entire communities with annihilation. Societies crumble as populations tragically justify their xenophobia and take up arms. The First Century After Beatrice is, paradoxically, the lyrical memoir of a French entomologist and intellectual who leads the campaign to eradicate the drug. Interwoven is the story of his love for the two women with whom he shares his his companion and lover, Clarence, and their prized daughter, Beatrice.