GERMLINE

The ramifications of gene therapy are explored in clumsy, ham-fisted fashion in this debut novel, a scientific thriller pitting a brilliant geneticist against the Collaborate, a sinister group of government-funded industrialists. The novel opens with Dr. Kevin Kincaid taking his company's gene therapy technique to the public in a series of touchy-feely commercials that outline his ability to eliminate several deadly diseases. But Collaborate member E. Dixon Loring is monitoring Kincaid's efforts as he develops a final crucial gene-transporting sequence that would allow Loring and his boss, Eric Bertram, to create a de facto dictatorship based on a comprehensive eugenics program. The group's contact with Kincaid is a beautiful journalist named Helen Morgan, who has been done over to resemble Kincaid's late wife, who died in a fire along with his two young children. Erlick, a former surgeon and researcher, explains the science in exhaustive detail, bombarding the reader with acronyms and lengthy lectures on DNA and biotechnology. The complicated genetic material stands in stark contrast to a cliché-ridden plot featuring a series of ludicrous chase scenes as well as a lurid subplot that portrays the results of a flawed gene therapy program run amok. Though Erlick outlines some of the intriguing possibilities and perils of gene therapy, readers will be hard-pressed to stay the course. (Jan.)