First there was gold. Then oil. Then technology. Now - who controls the world's rare earths controls the future. It was supposed to be a simple corporate job. Check out the company, make sure the client was protected and take home a big paycheck. But with Boozy McBain and Boston O'Daniel nothing is ever as it seems. As their investigation draws them deeper into a world of corporate and geopolitical intrigue, they learn that their client's company may hold the key to the competition for power over the world's most vital resources - a battle for global control of rare earth minerals, critical to the future of everything modern society demands, from the green energy revolution to next generation weapons and consumer technologies. To protect the client they must navigate a mysterious array of government agencies and corporations, and go up against a man who is determined to possess the sources of the new wealth of the 21 st century, from Africa to Asia to America - and perhaps the stars. A man of relentless ambition with a reputation for heartlessness in his quest to wrest control of the rare earth monopoly from China and build the empire of the future at any cost. The deeper the detectives dig the more enemies they make, from corporate boardrooms and black tie galas to the hopeless despair of the Congo, and the more personal the search becomes for each, driven by the seductive call of wealth, glamour and exotic danger.