Goodreads asked Julia Watts:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Julia Watts My latest novel, "Gifted and Talented," was inspired by my experiences when my children who were attending an "honors" magnet academy in inner city Knoxville. While many of the teachers were wonderful, the magnet school setting itself became kind of a microcosm for me about what's wrong with parenting and education in our society: middle-class and upper-class "helicopter parents" micromanaging every aspect of their children's lives and futures while working class and poor parents are just trying to get by day to day. And all families are poorly served by an educational system which classifies children instead of supporting and encouraging them. I wrote "Gifted and Talented" to be a funny novel--and I think it is. But it's a funny novel about some serious issues.

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