Fourteen-year-old Embritt Waters has just begun to settle in for a summer of windsurfing to relieve the drudgery of his job at Pinkerson's Pharmacy. The routine is quickly broken by the appearance of Uncle Walter and the startling revelation that Em's parents are alive and well after having mysteriously disappeared while on a scientific expedition. Em's life is turned on end when he discovers the facts of his parent's whereabouts - South America, thirty million years in the past