Altered Fates: The Genetic Re-Engineering of Human Life

In the pages of this rich and detailed narrative, whose characters include the field's leading scientists as well as key patients and their families, the Pulitzer Prize-winning authors tell the story of the race to be the first to do gene therapy (a feat almost certain to garner a Nobel Prize and a place in medical history), uncovering the behind-the-scenes machinations and rivalries among the prima-donna researchers at some of the world's leading medical centers, including the National Institutes of Health. They also reveal the details of the initial human experiments in gene transfer and the agonizing decisions faced by the families of the first children to be submitted to the therapy.

As Daniel Kevles observed in the New York Times Book Review, "Mr. Lyon and Mr. Gorner are highly knowledgeable about the state of human and medical genetics, and their treatment of both the science and its practitioners is vivid, accessible, and . . . gripping."

Author: Jeff Lyon
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 10/01/1996
Pages: 636
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 1.72lbs
Size: 9.20h x 6.12w x 1.21d
ISBN: 9780393315288

Review Citation(s):
New York Times 11/24/1996 pg. 32
Booklist 12/01/2000 pg. 685

About the Author
Lyon, Jeff: - Jeff Lyon and Peter Gorner, recipients of the Pulitzer Prize for Journalism in 1987 for the stories on which Altered Fates was based, write for the Chicago Tribune. They live in Chicago.