On a tour of the bubbling fumaroles of Yellowstone park, Anca, a rising-star biologist, sneaks off to steal samples of an ancient bacterium. Her off-and-on boyfriend, Warren the statistician, frowns on the behavior, until their analysis of the cells' ancient DNA chains reveals a pattern too regular to be anything but deliberate. Is it the signature of the Creator himself? Or a message left billions of years ago by an alien life form? In "Genie," master fiction writer Richard Powers goes sci-fi, to delightful and deranging effect.
On a tour of the bubbling fumaroles of Yellowstone park, Anca, a rising-star biologist, sneaks off to steal samples of an ancient bacterium. Her off-and-on boyfriend, Warren the statistician, frowns on the behavior, until their analysis of the cells' ancient DNA chains reveals a pattern too regular to be anything but deliberate. Is it the signature of the Creator himself? Or a message left billions of years ago by an alien life form? In "Genie," master fiction writer Richard Powers goes sci-fi, to delightful and deranging effect.