Denver, CO
Here's some answers to frequently asked questions that you might have about the new novel. Time for a quickie Q & A and FAQ about FADED....
Q. Is FADED your LA novel?
A.
FADED takes place in LA on the fringes of Hollywood. We spent a decade
in LA (2012-22) after a short stint in San Francisco. We moved to
Colorado in the summer of 2022 and I wrote this last summer. After
spending one year away, the timing was ideal because LA was still
somewhat fresh in my mind and my perspective began to shift a bit.
Q. FADED is a comedy and satire?
A.
Yes. FADED is a a nod to Billy Wilder films, but the tone is a
throwback to some of my favorite comedies from the late 1970s and early
1980s. Jackson McCool, the protagonist in FADED, is a mix of Bill
Murray's film characters (Stripes, Meatballs) plus bit of Matthew Broderick (Ferris Bueller, WarGames) and Chevy Chase (Fletch). There's a sliver of Bruce Willis during a short time he was a budding TV star (Moonlighting) before he became a movie star.
Q. One of your characters played pro football, but I don't recognize the team names. Why?
A.
Mingus Christmas played linebacker for the Miami Sharks. In my literary
universe, the major pro football league is known as GIL or the Grid
Iron League. I wanted to avoid any potential legal entanglements with
the NFL, which is why the GIL is the stand in from the NFL in both FADED
and THE KICKER. The local pro football team in FADED is known as the LA
Demons.
Q. I thought you wrote two manuscripts last summer? What happened to the other one?
A.
Yes, that's true. I wrote a memoir -- DEBASER (tentative title) --
which takes place in NYC in 1989. It's based on the summer before my
senior year in high school. You're only 16 once, and that summer before I
turned 17 was a pivotal time. I wrote DEBASER fairly quickly (in less
than 3 weeks) in June 2023 after spending nearly six months in NYC
helping out with a family illness. The subject matter is a little too
personal and I doubt it will get published. I wrote for myself to help
make sense of an intense stint in NYC while I stayed in my childhood
bedroom for several months. I might revisit it sometime down the line.
Q. So, FADED is the second manuscript you wrote last summer?
A.
Yes. I began it in July 2023 and completed the first draft in early
August. I tend to write very fast, but edit very slow. FADED took around
three weeks to complete the first draft. I completed subsequent drafts
in January 2024.
Q. Are all your novels linked in its own literary universe?
A.
Yes. In an homage to Kevin Smith's cinematic universe, there are direct
references to characters in previous published novels including FRIED PEACHES, GUARD THIS, and JACK TRIPPER STOLE MY DOG. There's also
character connections to two unpublished manuscripts for THE KICKER and
DEBASER. I also incorporate the fictional world of other authors
including Michael Chabon, Jonathan Lethem, Donna Tartt, and Bret Easton
Ellis.
Q. What's up with the eye patch? Did you really write FADED with one eye?
A.
The rumors are true. I have been experiencing vision problems in my
left eye since the summer of 2022. We had a setback in July 2023, and I
was sidelined for two weeks when I went blind in my left eye. I wore an
eye patch during that time and started FADED. I wrote one chapter per
day mostly to keep myself sane and laugh with the characters. As my
vision improved, I quickly finished the first draft before a potential
surgical date. I essentially wrote FADED because I freaked out that the
vision loss would be permanent, and to address the anxiety over the
question -- what if surgery doesn't work?
Q. What's up with THE KICKER?
A.
It's still marinating. I hope to take another crack at sometime in
2024. I wrote the first draft at the end of 2020. I set aside time to
work on a rewrite in April 2021, but I had too many things I wanted to
change yet didn't have enough time to pull off a proper rewrite in the
time I had allotted. That's why I pivoted and cranked out GUARD THIS
instead. I wanted to work on the new draft of THE KICKER in the summer
of 2022 when first moved to Colorado, but it got sidetracked when my
vision issues began. I planned to work on it in January 2023, but then I
had to move back to NYC to help my brother and mother.
Q. Were you listening to a lot of audiobooks before/during FADED?
A.
I was sidelined for two weeks in July with vision problems, and spent
that time in total darkness while holed up in our guest bedroom because
it's the darkness room in the house. I listened to a dozen audiobooks to
keep sane because it was difficult to watch/stream with one eye. I
devoured audiobooks and consumed like two per day, so I revisited Infinite Jest by
David Foster Wallace. The book is over 1,000 pages and the audiobook
clocked in at 55 hours. I started/stopped reading the massive tome multiple times in
the 1990s. When I finally conquered it, I has spread it out
over several months. I listened to the Infinite Jest audiobook at 1.5x speed and it took me a week or so. There's one character in FADED who is a former tennis prodigy, which is my homage to DFW.
I consumed other audiobooks during this stretch that influenced FADED because it was fresh in my mind.
- Blue Movie by Terry Southern
- Pappyland by Wright Thompson
- The Creative Act by Rick Rubin
- Deliver Me from Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen's 'Nebraska' Album by Warren Zanes
- Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin): A Memoir by Sly Stone
Q. What were some of your other inspirations behind FADED?
A. I listened to the first seven Steely
Dan albums (recorded/released between 1972-80) while writing the first
draft and it was in heavy rotation during the rewrites.
I revisited two books including Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem and Heat 2 by Michael Mann.
I also had three books about Hollywood on my mind. Hello, He Lied & Other Tales from the Hollywood Trenches was written by Lynda Obst who produced some big films in the 1980s-90s. I was also heavily inspired by The Devil's Candy by Julie Salamon, which chronicled the insanity behind the film adaptation of Tom Wolfe's novel The Bonfire of the Vanities. Lastly, there's The Day of the Locust by Nathaniel West about Hollywood in the 1930s.
Jon Favreau hosted Dinner for Five
on IFC back in the early 2000s. During the show, he ate a meal with
four guests who shared funny and strange stories about working in
Hollywood. Many of those throwaway stories were an inspiration for this
book.
I love a good show biz story, and the odder the better. I
attempted to fictionalize a
few I heard over the years. Wil Wheaton told me a few bizarre stories,
and Kevin Smith often shared hysterical stories during his Q&As with
his legion of fans.
I was not even an hour into watching Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood when I made a decision to write an LA novel sooner than later.
All of Noah Baumbach films, especially Greenberg, were on my mind during the first draft.
Paul Thomas Anderson flicks especially his ones set in LA were an
inspiration. PTA is heavily influenced by Robert Altman, and his films
were a creative beacon.
Richard Linklater,Whit Stillman, Kelly Reinhardt, Spike Lee, Wes Anderson, and Jim Jarmusch are all excellent filmmakers and their work has always been a massive influence on me.
Damien Chazelle's film Babylon
-- about the rough transition from silent films to talking films -- was
also an inspiration.Hollywood just survived multiple guild strikes and in the era of streaming wars and the rise of AI, so it felt compelling to write a story about this transition phase almost a century after silent films gave way to talkies.
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FADED is available in paperback and as an ebook for Kindle devices.
