"Is there a secret sauce behind those rare families that boast multiple highly successful children? Award-winning New York Times journalist weaves story with science in pursuit of answers. Acclaimed New York Times investigative journalist Susan Dominus profiles six families with several exceptionally accomplished children in order to tease apart the various factors that might have led to their success, including inherited tendencies. She starts with the iconic Brontë sisters, whose remarkable literary success inspired endless speculation about the reason for so much talent under one roof. Dominus, herself the mother of twin teenagers, then moves to the present moment, relating the fascinating trajectories of families from diverse cultural, racial and socio-economic backgrounds, including young parents from China who fled the one-child policy to open a Chinese restaurant in Appalachia and sent four children to elite colleges and careers that give back in technology and medicine; the Groff family, whose claim to fame is not just an award-winning novelist but an Olympic athlete and a notable entrepreneur; and the Holifields, raised in the Jim Crow South and boasting two powerful attorneys, both Harvard law school graduates, and a cardiologist, all three influential, in their own ways, in civil rights. Woven into these and other inspiring stories is an account of centuries of scientific research into the question of nature vs. nurture in predicting outcomes"--

Dominus profiles six families with multiple highly successful children to explore the factors contributing to their achievements, including the role of genetics. The book examines families from diverse backgrounds, such as the literary Brontë sisters, Chinese immigrants in Appalachia who sent four children to elite colleges, the Groff family with achievements in literature, athletics, and entrepreneurship, and the Holifield family with influential careers in law and medicine rooted in the Jim Crow South. Interwoven with these stories is an overview of scientific research on the nature versus nurture debate in predicting life outcomes.