Generosity by Richard Powers

 

What if there was a happiness gene?  Russell Stone is an adjunct professor at a Chicago university, teaching creative writing to a group of night students.  One student in particular, Thassa Amzwar, catches his attention.  An immigrant from a war-torn country, her family decimated by violence leaving her the only survivor, she is the most content person Russell has ever met.  The entire class focuses around her and she draws attention wherever she goes.

She is seeing a counselor, Candace.  Candace thinks she might have a rare condition that leaves the individual happy and refers her.  Soon a nanotechnologist working on mapping genes to find cures for diseases hears of Thassa and tests her extensively, claiming to have found the genes in her makeup that correlate with happiness.  

Now everyone wants to know this woman and see if they can also find a way to claim some of her happiness.  She is hounded by strangers, writing and calling, showing up at her dorm just wanting some of her attention, hoping that she will provide answers to their lives.  Russell is fired for his role in making Thassa vulnerable and Candace is warned that she faces the same fate if she doesn't separate herself from Thassa.  Russell and Candace who have become a couple, reluctantly back off from Thassa, leaving her on her own to face her new fame.

This book is prescient.  It was written in 2009 but now many of the things Powers writes of are here.  Gene mapping, using nanotechnology to cure diseases such as sickle cell and the public clamoring for more and more successes are now in the news everyday with scientists winning the Nobel Prize for their work in the field.  Powers questions whether such gene manipulation is moral or is it more immoral to not use the knowledge available to ease suffering when available.  His projections of the future form the base of his writing which often uses scientific work to predict the future and explore moral questions that weren't issues a few decades ago.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.