Misspent Youth
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
Be careful what you wish for...
Jeff Baker is a legend. He's an internationally-renowned inventor and philanthropist extraordinaire, and at seventy-eight he's given the world much of his genius. So in 2040, when Europe can finally rejuvenate a human being after decades of research, Baker becomes first choice for the gift of youth. And after eighteen months in a German medical facility, Jeff returns home looking no more than twenty.
The successful rejuvenation feels like a miracle - until the glow starts to fade. Jeff's relationship with his ex-model wife changes drastically. He also sees his son Tim, and Tim's gorgeous girlfriend, in a whole new light.
As his pensioner friends start to resent what Jeff has become, he becomes increasingly aware that the world is watching. For great gifts come at a price and he will be expected to contribute yet more brilliant research to justify his place in the history books.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
British space opera author Hamilton (The Dreaming Void) isn't quite up to his usual standards in this cautionary tale about tinkering with the human body. Several decades in the future, life has been revolutionized by the datasphere, the Internet's successor, made possible by the memory crystal. Its inventor, Jeff Baker, has been universally lionized following his altruistic refusal to patent the design. Baker, now 77, is selected by the Eurohealth Council as the guinea pig for a new biotechnology that replaces his aged genes, giving him the body of a 20-year-old. Unfortunately, the goal of the experiment to have Baker's genius applied to energy conservation is derailed by his raging hormones, which lead him to hit on every attractive woman in sight, including his teenage son's girlfriend. The predictable ensuing scenes of passion and parent-child conflict are not particularly interesting, and the unconvincing sentimental ending likewise disappoints.
