"The Only True Genius in the Family" by Jennie Nash

The Only True Genius in the Family
Jennie Nash
Berkley Books
ISBN: 978-0-425-22575-2

There’s a temptation to pass this book off as merely superior chick lit, and in some senses, it does contain similar characteristics. There’s a woman and mother at the center of the story, there’s family relationships, and a coming to terms with the death of a family member at the core of the novel.

Ah, but then, author Jennie Nash raises the stakes by introducing two very unusual subjects so rarely probed in such detail that bring her writing game to an entirely literary level. The first is just how parents injure their children, and how all of us carry the scars of childhood with us throughout our lives, reliving those same behaviors within our own family.

The second, perhaps more interesting is the study of creativity. Does it emanate from genius, or is it a seed that we all carry within us that some people are simply more free to express? In The Only True Genius in the Family, the central character Claire is a food photographer with a successful career. Unless you compare it with her father’s, of course. Her father is a true American icon, a landscape photographer in the tradition of Ansel Adams or Edward Weston.

Adding to this feeling of self doubt comes Claire’s daughter, Bailey, who not only has a special relationship with Claire’s impossibly difficult father, but is an outstanding artist in her own right. Bailey is just on the cusp of greatness as she puts on her graduate show for her MFA. A mother shouldn’t feel jealous, right? In fact, she is happy for her daughter’s success, but there’s this unhappy voice within Claire that keeps muttering that both her father and daughter “just had it so easy.” Everything they touch turns to gold, and in Claire’s case, genius seems to have skipped a generation (or so her father painfully notes).

With this rich material, author Nash never gets maudlin, but instead takes us into Claire’s world, and allows us to feel her pain, as she literally begins to lose her own creative vision with the death of her father. It’s a gripping story that will have you thinking about the characters long after you reach the last page. It’s a great read, even for chicks.