Prodigy

Every parent hopes for a perfect child. Jake Chalmers, paediatrician and geneticist, knows how to make one. He creates Sophie, a daughter as lovely as she is brilliant. A prodigy. But he could never have foreseen the explosive emotional consequences when she discovers how she gained her prodigious intellect, nor ever imagined the bizarre and terrifying form in which her unconscious rage takes its revenge.From the moment of her birth, Jake is determined to do everything to develop Sophie's extraordinary mind. His wife Alex argues it is unfair to push Sophie to the limit - unfair, too, to favour her over her older brother, Danny, a Down's child. To Jake, it is irresponsible not to. And he has his reasons why it is vital, reasons he cannot declare.But what of the girl's emotional development? What happens when feelings are deliberately subordinated to intellect? As Sophie grows to full flower, genius and passion are set in fatal conflict. With the pressures building up, Sophie struggles vainly to hold on to reason. But she is no ordinary girl, and when her suppressed feelings finally find release, no one, not even Jake, could have imagined the extraordinary form they take and the terrible, tragic consequences they entail.