They Want to Use a 5-Year-Old Genius: A Scene from The Star Child by Eric Valdespino

They Want to Use a 5-Year-Old Genius: A Scene from The Star Child by Eric Valdespino

What happens when a profoundly gifted child stops being seen as a child and begins to be viewed as an opportunity?

That question lies at the heart of The Star Child, the thought-provoking novel by Eric Valdespino.

In this dramatic scene inspired by the novel, a university committee gathers behind closed doors to discuss five-year-old Abe Cohen—a child whose extraordinary intelligence and mysterious knowledge have already begun attracting attention far beyond his family and small Kentucky community.

A Gifted Child Becomes an Opportunity

A senior member of the university committee sees enormous possibilities in Abe:

“Listen, we have an opportunity. Five-year-old Abe Cohen could be invaluable to this university.”

But another member of the committee recognizes the disturbing implications.

“We can’t use a child to attract wealthy donors. We need to be honest about our motives.”

The response reveals exactly how far some are willing to go:

“Honesty doesn’t fund universities. He’s ours to use.”

For the people sitting around the conference table, Abe’s extraordinary abilities represent prestige, attention, influence, and potentially enormous financial opportunity.

For Abe’s parents, however, he is still their five-year-old son.

And that difference becomes increasingly important.

Who Is Abe Cohen in The Star Child?

Abe Cohen is no ordinary gifted child.

From an extraordinarily young age, he possesses knowledge that seemingly should be impossible for him to have. He speaks about the formation of stars, the persistence of memory, human existence, and ideas far beyond the understanding expected of a five-year-old.

Even more mysteriously, Abe begins displaying characteristics of his grandfather, Rabbi Abraham Cohen—a man who died six years before Abe was born.

His voice, mannerisms, insights, and memories suggest that something of the rabbi may have survived death and returned through the child.

Is it reincarnation?

Inherited consciousness?

An unexplained connection between generations?

Or something even more extraordinary?

When Extraordinary Intelligence Attracts Powerful People

As Abe’s abilities become known, curiosity turns into something more dangerous.

Academics want to study him.

Religious leaders struggle to understand what he represents.

Government authorities become interested.

Institutions begin imagining how his abilities might be used.

The remarkable child at the center of the story gradually becomes surrounded by adults who see significance, opportunity, danger, or power whenever they look at him.

Too few simply see Abe.

A Story About Childhood, Consciousness, and the Unknown

At its emotional center, The Star Child by Eric Valdespino is not simply a story about an extraordinarily intelligent child.

It is a story about what happens when the world encounters something it cannot understand.

It explores questions of reincarnation, consciousness, memory, gifted children, spirituality, science, institutional power, parental devotion, and the mystery of human existence.

And beneath all of those larger questions is something beautifully simple:

A mother and father trying to protect their little boy.

Discover The Star Child by Eric Valdespino

How would the world react if a five-year-old child demonstrated knowledge and abilities that challenged everything we believed about intelligence, memory, consciousness, and life itself?

Would we protect him?

Study him?

Fear him?

Or try to use him?

The Star Child invites readers into that unsettling possibility—and into the extraordinary life of Abe Cohen.