As an author, I was influenced heavily by my high school and college English teachers who taught me the value of a good story and the simple joy of telling it. The essence of my first published novel, THE MENDELIAN THRESHOLD (August 2000, Tattersall Publishing), I owe to my high school biology teacher, the late Dr. Bill Butefish, who planted that first seed of ethical curiosity about "science playing God", and who first uttered the newly-coined term "clone" during one of his many incredible lectures.