The Heywoods are the sort of clan that, faced with hopelessness, prefer to invest in false hope and work to make it real. They're strapping young men, mostly, for whom the traffic lights have always been green: Stephen, a carpenter and the family rebel; his brothers, Jamie and Ben; their parents, John and Peggy. In the words of a longtime friend, the Heywoods have "never really known trouble."
Ninety percent of ALS sufferers are dead within five years, and Stephen, rangy and witty, responds to his diagnosis by doing as much as he can while he can. As Ascher and Jordan settle in for the long haul, he marries his girlfriend ("What will people say? Doesn't matter," is her cheerful comment), has a son, oversees the rebuilding of a carriage house on his parents' land, getting his hands dirty until they can no longer measure and cut the boards on their own. "Want to take a rest?" asks one of his workers. "I don't have much time," Stephen responds.
Over the course of "So Much So Fast," he recedes slightly into the background as his brother Jamie's efforts to find a cure take center stage. A mechanical engineer, Jamie quits his job to set up a foundation and raise funds; he establishes a research laboratory and stocks it with local geniuses and an awful lot of mice. The latter are bred with the human ALS gene; they die within five months, and it isn't pleasant to see.
Nor is the increasing desperation with which Jamie carries on his crusade. He calls it "guerrilla research" and tests drugs that have been approved for other diseases; he makes his data public and dispenses with peer review. And why shouldn't he, since his brother's dying? The medical establishment reacts with the distaste reserved for a bum in a church. "He's either the next Einstein or a complete idiot," says someone about Jamie. Jamie's own analysis: "I am aware that I am insane."
