Prodigy [Hardcover]

Dave Kalstein (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 27, 2005

"If the characters from Less Than Zero and The Secret History woke up in a novel by Philip K. Dick, they'd get along famously with the precocious students of Stansbury."
-Dustin Thomason, bestselling author of The Rule of Four

A thriller set in the future at an ultra-elite prep school that asks: what is the price of perfection?

In the year 2036, the world's best boarding school is the Stansbury School. The students, better known as specimens, are screened at a young age and then given twelve years of the finest education -- and developmental drug regiment --available.

 

Stansbury graduates -- physically and mentally -- are in a class all by themselves. Four out of five go onto Harvard, Yale or Princeton; twenty out of the top thirty Forbes 500 companies have Stansbury CEOs, eight graduates have become U. S. Senators, and two sit on the Supreme Court. 

 

But when a string of alumni are murdered, school officials -- looking to avoid a public relations disaster -- decide to keep the police in the dark. 

 

They discreetly ask the school's Valedictorian to solve the mystery, but he discovers that the most obvious culprit (the school's resident chemically imbalanced delinquent -- and the Valedictorian's nemesis) is being framed.

Together, the two unlikely allies uncover a massive conspiracy that reaches to the highest levels of the Stansbury administration and the United States government.

 

A riveting thriller about America's obsession with genius and the potential of youth, Prodigy is not only a chilling vision of the very near future, it's an authentic coming-of-age story for the 21st Century.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The Stansbury School's class of 2036—"flagship editions of youth"—are "bred... for top-of-the-line performance," poised to matriculate at the best colleges and destined to dominate the private and public sectors. After a 12-year regimen of chemical enhancement, conditioning and ideology inside Stansbury's high-rise virtual prison, in the megalopolis of San Angeles, these co-ed high school students, known as "specimens" in Kalstein's cautionary debut, emerge a master race of ninja-assassin geniuses: unnaturally tall, lethal and intelligent—at the cost of imagination and individualism. The story hinges on two students, both full-ride scholarship orphans, who form an unlikely partnership after six recent Stansbury graduates are murdered. Valedictorian Thomas Oliver Goldsmith has put his "blue collar work ethic and indomitable will" behind Stansbury's mission, while Winston Cooley, a rebellious malcontent, refuses to swallow the mandated drugs or the school's supposedly high-minded ideals. When Cooley unwittingly ends up at the scene of an alum's murder, the school's administration puts Goldsmith on the case. For Stansbury, the scandal could jeopardize the school's chances to receive a $1 trillion-a-year research grant from the government. For Cooley, his very freedom is at stake. Kalstein's action-packed comment on the price of "progress," the absurdity of hypercompetitive education and the myth of meritocracy hurtles to a satisfying if predictable conclusion.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

This genre-blending mix of science fiction, thriller, and bildungsroman begins in 2036 with the murder of one of Stansbury School's very few ne'er-do-well alumni. Stansbury doesn't have a lot of failures because it churns out prodigies: the school's "med cycle" makes kids big, strong, brilliant, and hard-working learning machines. (It also makes the girls big breasted, as is mentioned several dozen times.) Stansbury's grads have already cured AIDS and cancer, invented flying machines (natch), and been elected to the U.S. Senate. In fact, the Senate is considering a $1 trillion grant to Stansbury. But then the school's valedictorian starts asking questions about alumni murders. He joins up with a drugged-out, bottom-of-the-class kid named Cooney, and together they race to unravel the plot. Engrossing despite its well-trod utopia-gone-bad plot, the book is so well imagined that one cares about the school's fate from the start. And the characters are vivid as well, befitting what is, beneath its fast-paced surface, a thoughtful novel about boarding-school life. The climax and resolution prove too predictable, but readers will have fun nonetheless. John Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books; First Edition edition (December 27, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312340966
• ISBN-13: 978-0312340964
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.9 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,906,570 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Much better than "The Rule of Four", January 17, 2006

By 

Samer T Ismail "SF & classical music fan" (Danbury, CT) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Prodigy (Hardcover)

The description of this book in the liner gave me the impression that this book was intended to be a science-fiction retread of "The Rule of Four": part thriller, part touching coming-of-age drama. "Prodigy" succeeds at both halves better than did "The Rule of Four."

The best thing this book has going for it is Stansbury Academy itself. While a few plot details go over the top, it is easy to see how Stansbury could have developed in exactly the way Kalstein suggests.

But perhaps more importantly, this book also takes a somewhat satiric view--primarily in the side-plots and backstories--at the pressures society puts on its children to become prodigies, and the price those children pay as a result. In this regard, the scenes regarding Stansbury's valedictorian are particularly brutal. On the other hand, Kalstein also knows that there *are* some real-life prodigies to celebrate; the scene about a star athlete at Stansbury stands out in that regard.

This is a book I would recommend to just about anyone.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars PRODIGY is amazing, January 13, 2006

By 

Gary W. Radovich (Long Island, New York) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Prodigy (Hardcover)

Dave Kalstein's PRODIGY was one of the most enjoyable fiction reads that I've had in the past 10 years. It's a real page turner of a thrill ride and I literally couldn't put it down once I began. The writer certainly has a way with words and puts you right into the character's mindsets and you almost feel as if you are right among them as the events start to unfold. A very very impressive debut and PRODIGY gets my highest recommendation ! And there is plenty of social commentary that is quite incisive throughout the novel...where did this 29 year old writer come up with all this great material ?

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Worth a read, August 8, 2006

By 

K. Byerly (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Prodigy (Hardcover)

Prodigy is an solid, impressive novel. Kalstein's prose is stylish yet efficient and his characters are richly drawn and sympathetic. Kalstein takes his time early on, but it pays off: Our glimpses of the characters' lives strengthen our connection to them and ensure that we care about their fate, and Kalstein's attention to detail in establishing the story's elaborate future history lends the setting an extra level of versimilitude. And once the plot gathers steam, it's hard to put the book down.

Occasionally, the story's fictional world strains credulity, but not where you'd think. The audacious broad strokes, in which Kalstein extrapolates the politics of this new world, ring true. It's the smaller details that sometimes stick out. Is it just a coincidence that all the main characters' favorite literature and music hails from the "late 20th century"? Each time a reference to Kenneth Lonergan or The Strokes or a classic Shelby appears, it's hard to escape the feeling that the author is name-checking his own favorites. And the surprisingly outlandish laser-syringe feeding system, while facilitating an excellent set piece, also seems to create a forgivable yet significant plot hole.

In spite of these nitpicks, however, Prodigy remains an engaging read with vivid characters and an entertaining rollercoaster plot, as well as powerful moments of genuine emotional weight.