Nobel Genes, as in being conceived from a Nobel price winner sperm bank donor, is what this teenaged boy believes he has. When his scholastic abilities don’t match expectations, he beings to question the story that his single mom has told him throughout his life. The unnamed boy in this 1st person narrative has unanswered questions which he is afraid to ask out loud: who is father is, why he has no known relatives, and why aren’t the Nobel genes kicking in to make him the brilliant student his mother expects him to be. He also has the daunting responsibility of caring for his mother who suffers from mental illness, alcoholism, prescription drug abuse, and suicidal tendencies.

This is a disturbing and emotionally dark story, poignant and wrenching, but with  hopefulness that the boy will learn to control his own destiny, regardless of his genetic make up.

Spoiler Alert: a scene of incest; implied not graphically shown.