Tom is a retired scientific software engineer with fifty years of professional experience. He earned bachelor's and master's degrees from Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. Frequently, thoughts flow into his head during the night. The Young Boy was one of those thoughts. The first few chapters were purely figments of his imagination. But later he recalled his worldwide business and pleasure travels and used The Young Boy as the media to convey his memories to you, the reader. Tom's Italian background and travels through Italy influenced the boy and characters he met. Family is very important to Tom, and so it is to the young boy. Tom and the boy worked with their fathers in a family business from an early age. However, advanced education separated the boy and Tom from the businesses. Mathematics was key in the development of both Tom and the boy. Tom learned advanced math from on-the-job education. The boy had a natural talent for math. None of the characters in the book have names. The author did not want the reader to preconceive the personalities of the characters.