Soundless

Fei has never known a world with sound. Everyone in her mountain village is deaf, and has been for as long as she can remember. Avalanches and broken, rocky ground make it impossible to climb down, so the villagers depend on a zipline that hauls food up the cliffs from Beiguo, a distant kingdom none of them has seen.

Then a new affliction spreads: people in the village start to lose their sight. As more of them go blind, the shipments on the zipline dwindle, and hunger sets in. For Fei and everyone she cares about, the future looks like darkness and an empty table.

One night a piercing noise wakes her, something no one in her village should be able to experience. Fei soon learns that this new sense gives her a strange and formidable power. She sets out to understand what is happening to her and to protect her people from the dangers closing in. Beside her is a young miner with rebellious instincts, whose company brings fresh risks and the chance of a romance.

Their quest takes them from the high peaks of their village down into the valley of Beiguo, where a truth waits that will upend everything they believed. Richelle Mead, best known for the Vampire Academy series, draws on Chinese folklore to build this fantasy of silence, scarcity and hidden power.