Review | Biohack by JD Lasica
biohacking (n): the practice of do-it-yourself biology. Biohacking takes place in small laboratories, usually non-university, or even garages. Scientific experiments with biological material, especially genes, done by people who are not official experts or scientists, either as a hobby or in order to make money or commit a crime.
Biohack takes the reader on a deep dive in the dark world of designer babies, human trafficking, Big Data, and unethical corporations in their search for wealth and prestige. JD Lasica’s book reminds me of Wall Street in the 1980s only in the very near future with genetics instead of stocks. The combination of greed, lack of moral integrity, and narcissistic drive made my skin crawl.
Sterling J. Waterhouse is the CEO of Birthrights Unlimited, a shadowy corporation located in Huston, Texas, where regulations are loose, enabling him to build an empire on genetic manipulation. Birthrights Unlimited sells itself as the next step in IVF, but lurking beneath its smoky glass facade are secrets that would make Dr. Frankenstein run for the hills.
Randolph Blackburn, a billionaire investor of Waterhouse’s company strives to see the great men and the genetics that made them so, spread out into the gene pool. Why should the minds of Lincoln and Einstein be lost to time when their greatness can be isolated and sold to the wealthy?
Dimitri Patrov, a silent investor of Birthrights Unlimited, is a kingpin in Minsk, Belarus who deals in under-aged girls as a commodity. Who better to supply Patrov with an unending supply of young girls with no family than Waterhouse’s creepy company? Through genetic manipulation, Patrov can custom order girls: blond, blue eyes, tall, thin, large breasts, etc. Whatever his clientele might, appreciate, and buy.
While Patrov would not only claim but welcome the label of misogynist, Waterhouse and Blackburn might balk at the idea. However, Waterhouse’s marketing campaign for the next step in reproduction, which not only takes the sex out of procreation, it also strives to remove the female element. Why deal with women to conceive, carry, and deliver Birthrights Unlimited babies when a machine can do it for them? Women are unpredictable, they have emotions, they want money for their services. The short of it, women as wombs are a liability. Balckburn, while elderly and old-fashioned in his thinking, sees the sole purpose of women as baby makers and even goes so far as to eschew his only granddaughter when she can’t fulfill that purpose.
In addition to creating custom order babies, Birthrights Unlimited has a series of side projects that focus on extracting DNA from great minds and celebrities. Can’t get the DNA legally? No problem. Birthrights Unlimited has tactical teams for that. A squad team of special operatives who go in and steal historic objects and bodies to help build on the human genome and isolate desirable traits to offer to Waterhouse’s customers.
After securing wealthy clientele, Birthrights Unlimited now needs to give a sympathetic face to their company. Enter Valerie Ramerez, a mom who lost her child to an accidental drowning and who has decided to clone her lost son with the help of Waterhouse’s company. As the face of the company, Valeria is reached out to by Kaden, a young woman with a complicated past, about the sordid experiments Birthrights Unlimited is conducting.
Lasica, an entrepreneur, gives the business aspect of Biohack a believable spin. The scenes taking place in boardrooms and office buildings are well written. Sharon Sullivan, the chief marketing officer of Birthrights Unlimited, is one of the most fleshed out characters. She’s tough, good at her job, and somewhat morally corrupt, but not to the point of the other Birthrights employees.
The only thing that took me out of the story was the many meticulous references to designer clothing. Since I have no care or knowledge of labels, I found the attention to what people wear was more of a distraction than character development.
Pieces of decor also get undue lip service. Lasica’s need to describe a table where computer monitors sit to the nth degree feels lopsided next to the description of rock music as “head-banger”. Much like clothing and styles, music is nuisanced. Giving a name to a band can say a lot about a character without having to spell it out.
Overall, the premise for Biohack is a good one. With all the DIY biohaking taking place in garages across suburbia, Birthrights Unlimited could be a reality in the very near future.
