Director Ron Howard bought the rights to turn this engaging thriller into a movie, and it's no wonder: the story of a 16-year-old autistic genius being protected by a renegade FBI operative against a secret government agency has all the elements of his kind of humanistic blockbuster. It also helps that Ryne Douglas Pearson--whose previous books, Capitol Punishment and October's Ghost, are also available in paperback--creates instantly likeable characters in unlikely situations.