Go Ask Your Father One Man Obsession with Finding His Origins Through DNA Testing (Audible Audio Edition) Lennard J Davis David L Stanley Books
Download As PDF : Go Ask Your Father One Man Obsession with Finding His Origins Through DNA Testing (Audible Audio Edition) Lennard J Davis David L Stanley Books
Every family has a secret. But what if that secret makes you question your own place in the family? Mixing equal parts memoir, detective story, and popular-science narrative, this is the emotionally charged account of one man's quest to find out the truth about his genetic heritage - and confront the agonizing possibility of having to redefine the first 50 years of his life.
Shortly before his father's death, Lennard Davis received a cryptic call from his uncle Abie, who said he had a secret he wanted to tell him one day. When finally revealed, the secret - that Abie himself was Davis's father, via donor insemination - seemed too preposterous to be true. Born in 1949, Davis wasn't even sure that artificial insemination had existed at that time. Moreover, his uncle was mentally unstable, an unreliable witness to the past. Davis tried to erase the whole episode from his mind.
Yet it wouldn't disappear. As a child, Davis had always felt oddly out of place in his family. Could Abie's story explain why? Over time Davis's doubts grew into an obsession, until finally, some 20 years after Abie's phone call, he launched an investigation - one that took him to DNA labs and online genealogical research sites, and into intense conversations with family members whose connection to him he had begun to doubt.
At once an absorbing personal journey and a fascinating intellectual foray into the little-known history of artificial insemination and our millennia-long attempt to understand the mysteries of sexual reproduction, Davis's quest challenges us to ask who we are beyond a mere collection of genes.
Go Ask Your Father One Man Obsession with Finding His Origins Through DNA Testing (Audible Audio Edition) Lennard J Davis David L Stanley Books
An interesting story of a man's quest to know his true paternity. Few people have the resources he had available to aid in his search. It was fascinating to read about dna-testing on a person long-dead. His writing style is rather obsessive and verbose. I skipped the technical parts because I am already acquainted with the history and procedures of artificial insemination and I was anxious to see how his story ended. If I did not know about them, I would appreciate their inclusion.Product details
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Go Ask Your Father One Man Obsession with Finding His Origins Through DNA Testing (Audible Audio Edition) Lennard J Davis David L Stanley Books Reviews
This book has an interesting premise. At the funeral of the author's father, his uncle happens to mention that he is in fact the author's biological father (an early example of artificial insemination). Needless to say, whether this is in fact true will keep you reading - or make you jump to the end, like I did. ;^) Also on the plus side, the author has a very nice writing style.
On the minus side, I think this is another one of those books that would have made a much better magazine article. There's simply not enough here to pad it out to 200+ pages. Some of it's quite interesting - for example, the history of artificial insemination. Most of it, though, is not.
A lot of it rather obsessive (Davis is, in fact, the author of a book titled "Obession"). He comes from an interesting family, but it's not that interesting, at least to a casual observer. Now, if it had been a topic that others could relate to or at least find interesting (growing up in the 50s, being Jewish, having deaf parents, etc.), fine. There is just too much of one particular family and one particular author here however.
Here's an example of what I'm talking about
"Was this protector my father? Was his potency enough to pluck the inchoate me from the chaos of the universe and brand me out for his own? Or was he an impotent man who knew that his sperm was weak, slow, and fallible. Was his shadowboxing [he liked to box along with the Friday night fights] a way to make him feel strong and to make me feel that he was the hypermasculine father that I seemed to need and that he seemed to want me to need? How would he have felt, then, if he has to ask his younger, more potent brother to stand in for him in the fertility arena, as my uncle claimed? Did it seem that the referee and the crowds were laughing at him while he lay helpless and on the floow, knocked down, the lights spinning around him with the confusion of the world itself [his father was an amateur boxer]? Or did he feel that if he feinted left and sailed out a powerful right punch when (and if) he tricked fate and got science and his brother to help him have a child? Was he the patsy or the con man? Did he win the match or was he the bleeding slumped thing on the canvas floor trying to regain consciousness and get to his feet as the referee counted in silent numbers the sum of his fate?"
Good story, interesting subject, did learn from the author. There was a bit to much scientific info for a memoir. Well worth reading, DNA has made great differences in the world, not jut the authors life. The book is better the 3 starts, not quite a four, there isn't a half available.
Some insight into his dilemma but not compelling reading
Enlightning and well written. I found myself in the same situation as the author! Very helpful and comforting for me.
What a story! Fascinating and compelling prose! Lennard, you really draw me into your journey to the past! This is a gift for us who are facing the same quest! Thank you very much for all the efforts in sharing this extremely personal experience.
Lennard Davis chronicles his quest from denial to compulsion to find answers about his origins. When after the death of his parents he was told that the man who raised him was not his biological father, Davis did nothing to investigate this for two decades. Then he could leave it alone no longer. This is as much a journey through human feelings and through ethical questions as it is through the science of reproduction and DNA testing. It is both informative and thought provoking.
Wonderful read-with a personal touch that is rare
the author weaves a rather unique story of his life and relatives that will truly be enjoyable to anyone who grew up with a family that is unique- I believe the story is something we can all relate to
An interesting story of a man's quest to know his true paternity. Few people have the resources he had available to aid in his search. It was fascinating to read about dna-testing on a person long-dead. His writing style is rather obsessive and verbose. I skipped the technical parts because I am already acquainted with the history and procedures of artificial insemination and I was anxious to see how his story ended. If I did not know about them, I would appreciate their inclusion.
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