Amanda911
by Mark Schreiber
GENRE: YA (crossover)
BLURB:
“Sixteen-year-old Iowa schoolgirl Amanda Dizon may be the nation’s most unremarkable teenager, until she falls down a well and finds herself instantaneously transformed from irrelevant to influencer. Mark Schreiber’s sly, rollicking masterpiece, Amanda911, follows Amanda’s escapades and sends up the craven, fame-obsessed virtual culture of today’s adolescents. As insightful as Dickens and as innovative as Heller, Schreiber is the definitive satirist of the social media generation.”—Jacob M. Appel, author of Einstein’s Beach House
Excerpt:
I can’t believe you guys! exclaimed Nicole. You never heard of MakeItRain? It’s crowdfunding for personal tragedy.
But I only fractured one ankle, said Amanda. The doctor said I can probably go home tomorrow.
But nobody knew that when the story broke, did they?
What is this figure? asked Amanda’s mom. $305,050? Is that the goal?
The goal is ten thousand dollars! Nicole shouted above the music.
$305,050 is the amount pledged. So you can easily afford to buy me a Jaguar. I just want a basic one. And you’ll have money left over to buy a car painted rainbow colors for yourself, and probably a house with a life-size stuffed unicorn.
A life-size stuffed unicorn?
This can’t be legitimate, whispered Amanda’s mother.
Amanda’s mom grabbed her daughter’s arm. Can you please give us a minute, Nicole?
She helped her daughter into a wheelchair and wheeled her into the corridor, where it was quiet enough to talk in normal voices, and bright enough to see each other clearly.
She knelt down so that their gaze was level. Are you OK, darling?
Are you kidding? This is the best day of my life!
You suffered a traumatic experience.
The well? I should have fallen down that thing a long time ago!
Listen, this is all nice and fun, and I’m glad all your classmates have finally taken an interest in you, even if they have ulterior motives...
Mom, cut to the chase.
But none of this is real. It’s just entertainment. The RainMan account, the six million friends...
It’s seven million now!
Interview with Mark Schreiber
Any weird things you do when you’re alone?
A lot of people, unfortunately, consider reading weird. Particularly business people, who have bragged to me all my life how they have no time to read fiction because they are so busy doing important things. I also think; not a common pastime in our society. I mean think for hours, ruminate, daydream, let my mind wander, solve the world’s problems. My first wife often told me I think too much. She was right.
What is your favorite quote and why?
Amor fati, Latin for “love your fate.” Nietzsche made it famous. If I ever get a tattoo I would get that phrase. I am trying to love my fate, but I never have.
Who is your favorite author and why?
Shakespeare overall because of the density of his thought and his ability to express the darkest corners of the human experience so beautifully. Tolstoy for novelists because of his deep understanding of human behavior and his acceptance of our failings, except when it came to Napoleon.
What, in your opinion, are the most important elements of good writing?
Broad and deep knowledge of the human experience. That is why there are ten-year-old violinists and chess players, but no ten-year-old writers. An ear for the music of language and the way people talk. A vocabulary large enough that you understand sometimes the simplest words are best. The ability to create and inhabit a world of your own making, even if that world is the real world. Knowing the rules well enough so that you know when to break them.
Where did you get the idea for this book?
Seven years ago I started working with social media startups. I found the new profession of influencer fascinating. Yet novelists weren’t writing about these people. I decided to. My inspirations were wanting to explore the spectrum of the randomly famous to the deeply gifted, and the example of my niece Amanda, who fell down a hole and woke up in the hospital.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Mark Schreiber was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1960, graduated high school at age fifteen and began writing novels full-time. Princes in Exile, which explores a prodigy’s struggle to accept his own mortality at a summer camp for kids with cancer, was published in 1984 and made into a feature film in 1991. It has been published in ten countries, received two awards in Europe and was shortlisted for the Austria Prize. Carnelian, a fantasy, was published by Facet in Belgium. Starcrossed, a rebuttal to Romeo and Juliet, was published by Flux and translated into French and Turkish. His illustrated science book, How to Build an Elephant, was published as an Apple app by Swag Soft. He has written over forty books and received two State of Ohio Individual Writer Fellowships. For the last seven years he has been a digital nomad, living on four continents. He currently resides in Costa Rica.
TikTok @Amanda911
Website ~ Instagram ~ Twitter ~ Wikipedia
Buy links:
Amazon ~ Pleasure Boat Studio ~ Google
4 comments:
Thanks for hosting!
I liked the excerpt.
Sounds like a very good book.
Thanks Avid Reader for hosting! And thanks for your comments Rita and Sherry!
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