"Galaxy "Alex" Stern is the most unlikely member of Yale's freshman class. Raised in the Los Angeles hinterlands by a hippie mom, Alex dropped out of school early and into a world of shady drug-dealer boyfriends, dead-end jobs, and much, much worse. In fact, by age twenty, she is the sole survivor of a horrific, unsolved multiple homicide. Some might say she's thrown her life away. But at her hospital bed, Alex is offered a second chance: to attend...

The citizens of Chester's Mill, Maine, find their relationships strained and lives in danger after an inexplicable force field develops around the town, cutting it off from the outside world and resulting in a power struggle between local politician and drug lord Big Jim Rennie, who enjoys the idea of dominating an isolated populace, and people who disagree with Jim and want to investigate the origins of the dome.

In a small town on the coast of California, everyone over the age of fourteen suddenly disappears, setting up a battle between the remaining town residents and the students from a local private school, as well as those who have "The Power" and are able to perform supernatural feats and those who do not.