Piers Anthony

A discreet advertisement brings a group of apparently disparate individuals together to a bizarre rendezvous - on the ocean floor. The reasons for their selection are unclear: Don, an archaeologist, chronically shy, Gaspar, marine biologist, suffering from terminal directness, middle-aged Pacifica, and Melanie, whose normal exterior masks a strange genetic inheritance, seem, on the face of it, to have little in common - except their feeling that they are part of a greater plan .
a feeling that grows as they embark on their strange odyssey across the bed of the ocean . For the underwater explorers, the mystery of being out of phase with the world above water is heightened by that surrounding the mysterious Eleph - a mystery which is ultimately revealed to be more significant and bewildering than they could ever have imagined .