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    Generosity: An Enhancement
    Generosity: An Enhancement
    Generosity: An Enhancement
    Audiobook10 hours

    Generosity: An Enhancement

    Written by Richard Powers

    Narrated by David Pittu

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    The National Book Award-winning author of The Echo Maker proves yet again that "no writer of our time dreams on a grander scale or more knowingly captures the zeitgeist." (The Dallas Morning News).

    What will happen to life when science identifies the genetic basis of happiness? Who will own the patent? Do we dare revise our own temperaments? Funny, fast, and magical, Generosity celebrates both science and the freed imagination. In his most exuberant book yet, Richard Powers asks us to consider the big questions facing humankind as we begin to rewrite our own existence.

    A New York Times Book Review Notable Book of the Year

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Audio
    Release dateSep 29, 2009
    ISBN9781427207685
    Author

    Richard Powers

    Richard Powers is the author of New York Times bestseller Bewilderment; The Overstory, which won the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction; and The Echo Maker, which won the National Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; among many other novels. Powers has received a MacArthur Fellowship, a Lannan Literary Award, the James Fenimore Cooper Prize for Historical Fiction, and is a four-time National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. He lives in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains.

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    Reviews for Generosity

    4/5

    146 ratings11 reviews

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    • 1/5
      This title is incomplete, missing the last hour or so.
    • 5/5
      Generosity is an interesting choice of title for a book about happiness. Thassa, a refugee from the Algerian civil war, is incurably happy, so much so that her creative nonfiction teacher, Russell, asks a campus counselor, Candace, about her. Then scientist Thomas Kurton wants to find out what makes her tick. This is a book about nature vs. nurture, choice vs. chance, and fiction vs. fact. It's about the possibilities of genetic engineering and how far humans would, could, and should go. Like Powers' other work (The Overstory, Galatea 2.2), the writing is dense and beautiful; the ideas are deep and nuanced.
    • 4/5
      This is my fourth Richard Powers novel (after Gain, The Time of Our Singing, and The Overstory). One of the things I enjoy about his books is the way his complex narratives are delivered in precise but not overly complicated language. I’ve also come to appreciate the way reading him is enhanced by quick sidesteps to Wikipedia. So I was amused when fairly early in the story his campus counselor, Candace Weld, silently curses Wikipedia as adjunct instructor Russell Stone comes to her with questions about a student he thinks may be suffering from hypomania. I also appreciated the slices of Chicago scattered throughout the story, though eleven years on I suspect Stone couldn’t afford even a studio apartment in Logan Square.
    • 3/5
      Uhmmmm...gorgeously written but so unbelievably rich it kept putting me to sleep, of all things. So I want to give it a high rating for quality but I gotta say it's extremely literary (for when you want to get your academia/intelligentsia on).
    • 5/5
      A masterful novel that provides a fresh perspective on age-old questions of nature vs nurture. While Powers is as enamored as ever by the potential of science edge genetics and neuroscience to define and guide us toward a better life, his novel ultimately makes a brilliant and persuasive case for more traditional sources of human happiness - narrative, meaning, and compassion.
    • 4/5
      I listened to this on audiobook. It was fantastic. I was constantly thinking about what was going to happen with these characters who were so richly portrayed. There was also the lofty goal of writing a book about what it would be like if we discovered a woman genetically predisposed to happiness and well-being would. And I totally bought it! It was gracefully done and made for some good brain stimulation. The science fiction in the book was not totally original, but was handled in a way that made me completely believe what I was hearing and despair that it might actually be pulled off. Now, there's a lot more to this novel, such as ethics of journalism, philosophy and things that go over my head, and which I don't study up on, but I still greatly enjoyed it. I will be picking up as many works of his as I can if they are this good.
    • 5/5
      A long time ago, not having anything else to read, I got into the stories of Edgar Allan Poe. His dense language and heavy atmosphere was a drag at first. But you know? I got used to it, and then was able to pick up a story and read it as if it were a Hardy Boys novel. This experience made me more open to books that are hard to start. Richard Powers, like Poe, is hard to get started in, but once you get the rhythm of his writing, it gets you hooked. The guy is so talented that I found myself shaking my head in amazement at both his audacity and his utter skill in pulling me through a story that is both cerebral and fast paced. As of this writing, I have about ten pages left and still have no idea how it's going to end. As for the metafiction label, yes Powers writes about himself writing, but he comes across more as a narrator struggling with what his characters are going to do, becoming a character himself. I've read some really interesting books lately, and its good to see that authors are finding things to write about other than spies, guns, and courtrooms.
    • 4/5
      I actually enjoyed this more than the Echo Maker. I think that Richard Powers because of his technical style is easier take in a shorter novel such as Generosity. I enjoyed his style and the concepts because they reflect the increasing influence of the internet and instant feedback in our world. It is good to see more contemporary fiction such as Arthur Philips and Nick Hornby that incorporate the real world in their fictions. Technology exists and it should be part of today's fiction. I had a little trouble with final part of the book. I will definitely read more Powers.
    • 4/5
      "Enhancement. Why shouldn't we make ourselves better than we are now? Why leave something as fabulous as life up to chance?" "All good science pauses."Richard Powers is one of my favorite contemporary authors. He is erudite and hip at the same time. His novels often raise ethical and philosophical issues, but are never preachy, are always peopled with human and believable characters, and have plausible and engrossing plots.In [Generosity: An Enhancement], he tackles some of the issues raised by current genetic research. Russell is an adjunct professor of creative writing at a Chicago art college. From the first class session, he is dazzled and intrigued by Thassa, a Berber refugee from the Algerian Civil War. Despite suffering extreme hardships, including the loss of her parents, she is always upbeat and, well, Happy. Enter a biomedical research company on the verge of identifying and isolating the "happiness" gene, and Thassa's world is turned upside down.I enjoyed this book, and although it is as well-written as I would expect from a [Powers] book, it had a major flaw for me. I was not convinced that that Thassa was so special that anyone meeting her would know within minutes that she was one in a million. Thassa is engaging, upbeat, positive, optimistic, encouraging and you want to be around her, but she never comes across as uniquely so.However, as another reviewer here stated, [Powers'] worst is a lot better than many writers' best, so I still recommend the novel despite this flaw.3 stars
    • 4/5
      I call myself a big Richard Powers fan. I’ve only read one Powers book, but it was a wham-doozy. I often list it on my favorite all-time reads. It was brilliant, with clever word play and subplots that intertwine and characters who are---very strange---scientists and stories about human genes and computers, none of which I really know much about. It was fun and unexpected and, really, brilliant.And now I’ve finally completed my second Powers, though, truth be told, it was actually a listen not a read. So what do I think? Am I still a raving Powers fan? I’d say this one, though it began and proceeded with a powerful hit, would not quite ring my bell. I was waiting for the big, wonderful final ending that tied everything together and it didn’t happen. Or, possibly, it did happen, but it was so over my head that I just didn’t get it. I don’t want to give away the whole story (stop here if you are worried about spoilers) but I didn’t really understand our main heroine’s meltdown. What does that say?I imagine that I will reflect on this a little more (always the sign of a good book).
    • 4/5
      This is not one of Powers' s best books, but this author at his worst is better than most novelists at their best. An entertaining read as well as a serious critique of contemporary society and an exploration of some of the problems of biological enhancement for humans.