Independent Reading Reaction #4

As I’ve continued to read Double Helix by Nancy Werlin, I’ve found out that some of my earlier predictions were true. In the process of finding these predictions to be true, Eli’s mother passed away because of her Huntington’s disease and Eli’s father has started to open up to him more. After Eli’s mother died, his father and him had to sort through his mother’s things. While doing so Eli’s father showed him an old photo of Eli’s mother when she was eighteen. Immediately when Eli looked at the photo he saw that his mother looked just like Kayla. Eli knows that this can’t be a coincidence and because his father won’t explain things to him, he goes to talk to Dr. Wyatt. On his way to see Dr. Wyatt Eli remembers a time when he was seven, which he now realizes was when his parents found out that he is negative for HD.

               When Eli goes to meet with Dr. Wyatt he brings the old photo of his mother. He is hoping that Dr. Wyatt will be able to explain why she looks like Kayla, how he became HD negative, and why his father dislikes Dr. Wyatt. Eli finds out, just as I thought, that he was genetically altered. Dr. Wyatt took a number of eggs from his mother in order to find HD negative ones. Then Dr. Wyatt would fertilize one and implant it in Eli’s mother. This is why Eli is negative for Huntington’s. Eli hasn’t yet figured out how or why Kayla looks so much like his mother. However, I have a feeling that Dr. Wyatt used another egg he collected, fertilized it, and implanted it into someone without Eli’s parent’s permission. I believe that this “other” egg could be the reason Kayla resembles Eli’s mother, and why Eli’s father is mad at Dr. Wyatt.