I was asked to evaluate the book “Genesis Code”, which according to Amazon the book can be summarized as thus:
“Blue Magic, the latest designer drug linked to a rash of overdoses, might explain the needle mark on the arm of a young woman found dead in her Kansas City apartment. But when Star reporter Rich Azadian digs deeper, the clues point to a far more explosive story: MaryLee Stock was a special protégée of evangelical megapastor and power broker Cobalt Becker, who is poised to deliver his followers and the presidency to a firebrand right-wing senator in the next election. When Azadian sets out to prove that MaryLee’s death was no accident and she may have been carrying Becker’s genetically enhanced baby, the stakes become life itself.
In 2023 America—bankrupt, violently divided by the culture wars, and beholden to archrival China—the rules of the game are complicated. With the danger mounting, the dead bodies of young women piling up, Chinese agents circling, and the US Department of National Competitiveness moving in to quash his investigation, Azadian’s only option is to go rogue, assemble a team of brilliant misfits like himself, and begin the fight of his life to find out who is killing these women and why, and if any others like them may still be alive.”
you can also purchase the book here:
While the books is well written and the above abstract is accurate and the topic is interesting for me; it is a bit of a slow start. Which slow is not so much an issue with the book as it is an issue with me and the fact that if I have to think to understand the basic plot in the first chapter and if there is not so super advanced technology or magic or ancient secret Indiana jones style sort of thing right off the bat you have kind of lost me.
AND
Genetically engineered babies don’t count as super advanced technology any more. Maybe if they are super advanced trans-meta-humans ruling the world and are forcing humanity to treat them as gods then we can talk but in this book it is sad to say it is much more down to earth and likely to resonate well with the large demographic then I. To be fair to the book’s author if your ‘normal’ you might like this book. The book as stated is well written and about a topic that should be front and center of peoples minds.
Besides the slow process of getting into it that is more my fault (so I won’t take it out on the book as mentioned earlier) I do take issue with the authors stance that does come across in his writing and a short essay at the end of the book. Again I won’t take this out on the author in terms of rating but this is more a political issue I have.
Here is my issue…
What comes across in the book is that it seems that the author thinks that there should be ‘regulation’ on genetic engineering and that there is some kind of issue with people making genetically modified humans where their should clearly be no limits. I would vehemently disagree with the author. We should be able to genetically engineer anything we want and only if we do something that directly infringes on the rights of others should be deal with it as otherwise we limit research and progress. Nothing in my opinion is more important then progress towards one of several goals. Number one Immortality, number two long term survivability off world and well that is pretty much it. Anything that slows either of those two down I would take a dim view of and the author thinks that there should be some international body regulating this and treaties etc. that limit what can be done and where. In my mind a genetic arms race would be a good thing. He fails to convince me with facts on why this is bad…. certainly worth the cost of a few human lives to make a new species that is ‘better’ then human I think. His point about loosing of the elements that make us human seems to me that this could be a good thing. Less prone to act illogically and on emotions are good things…
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