Netwars: The Code. A high-tech serial thriller from the dark side of the net. Episode 1.
Welcome to the Deep Web. Those parts of the internet no search engine explores. The place where you can buy anything. Drugs, children, weapons.
Anyone can do it. And get away free.
Anthony Prince, head of PrinceSec, a firm which provides high-tech security for the government and major corporations, dies in a plane crash when crossing the English Channel. Responsible for Prince's death is a hacker named Strider. His real name is Scott Mitchell and in his day job at the National Cyber Crime Unit he uses legitimate means to get the bad guys. As Strider, his means are less legal. On the same night, PrinceSec is the target of a cyber-attack. When the NCCU is called to assess the damage, a link is found between Prince and a criminal hacker group called Black Flag. The race is on for Mitchell to protect his identity as Strider and to stop Black Flag before it's too late.
AUTHOR INTERVIEW
Hello, and welcome to Roxy’s Reviews.
Thank you so much for taking the time to visit with us today.
1. Tell us a bit about yourself.
I was
born in the UK and raised in South Africa, and now I have settled in the UK
again, after a bit of travel around the rest of the world. I live in London
with my partner and our dog, and a three-legged cat who doesn’t really like any
of us. I’m a bit of a geek, having always been interested in technology and
computers, even when games came on cassettes and took an hour to load! I have
been writing for a long time, but last year was the first year I dedicated
myself to it full time. Look what happens!
2. What inspires your writing?
Well,
that’s the joy of writing for me – anything that tickles your fancy can be the
subject of your next story. I read a lot of newspapers and cut out all of the
strange little stories that pique my interest. I keep them all in a bright
notebook, and I spend about an hour on each of them scribbling notes and
brainstorms. When I need a new idea, I turn to my notebook. There are so many
ideas still to write. Perhaps it’s because I never really figured out what job
I wanted to do when I was at school – I was a little bit interested in
everything – and that is excellent if you end up being a writer. It’s an open
ticket to be anything you want, through your characters, just for a little
while. I am fascinated by big questions, and why people believe what they
believe, or do what they do. I’m especially interested in questions of
morality, faith and the stranger posibilities of science.
3. Where did the idea for the project Netwars – Out of CTRL come from?
I was
approached by filmtank – the German production company responsible for the
whole cross-platform project. They were making a documentary about the threat
of cyberwar and cyberterrorism, and they wanted a fictional element to go with
it. They already knew that they wanted to do a graphic novel, and they asked me
to come on board as the writer. We had a big meeting of everybody involved in
the project in Berlin and we workshopped possible ideas, and then I went away
and wrote up some of the options. At first, my ideas were wild and Bond-like
and a bit silly, really. It was all conspiracy theories and urban myth. But, because
the graphic novel was going to tie in with a documentary feature and a web
documentary, I worked with the cyberwar and cyberterrorism experts that were
feeding into those pieces in order to come up with something plausible for the
graphic novels. Then, when the publisher came on board for the graphic novels,
they asked if I could write a novel too. I was thrilled, but I knew that the
story had to stand alone, and yet feel like it was part of the same world. At
first, I tried to tie the stories together more, but I quickly figured out that
it wouldn’t work. I want people to get a complete story, whichever part of the
project they find. In the weeks that preceded the commission from Bastei Lübbe,
I had been reading a lot about the Deep Web – that place underneath the World
Wide Web that isn’t scanned by regular search engines and on which you can
openly and (almost) anonymously buy drugs, weapons and even hire a killer. It’s
a crazy place, and one which most people still believe is in the realms of
fantasy. I knew I wanted to set my story in that world, and so I came up with
the idea of a character who works for the authorities as a specialist, but has
a dark past, and an even darker present. Because I had done so much research
for the graphic novels, I had a good base to start from, but the novel involved
a lot more work. It’s a classic crime thriller in a dark and terrifying place.
I’m sure that, thanks to my research for this book, I’m now on some kind of
government watch list! In fact, at one point I was convinced that the
government had bought the house next door just to spy on me – but that could
have just been the stress of hitting the deadline for the publisher!
4. What can fans of your Netwars = Out of CTRL Interactive Graphic Novel series expect from the standalone novel, published by Bastei Lübbe.
A
cracking good page turner! Hopefully. There are common elements, but it was
important to me that no one felt left out. I don’t want people to feel they
have missed something by not reading or seeing one part of the whole project –
all parts shoud stand alone. There is a character who links the web
documentary, the graphic novels and the novel – he’s only really central
to the web documentary, but he appears in each of the other parts. He’s a kind
of broker on the Deep Web – The Salesman. He’s a pretty evil guy. Anyway, fans
of both the graphic novels and the novel will see links through him. Hopefully
all parts of the project will make people think about how exposed we are, and
how trusting we are of those around us. Knowing that anything with an
(electronic) pulse can pretty much be turned into a weapon and used against
you, not to mention the ease with which your data can be used, stolen and
misapproriated – it’s all pretty scary. I hope that fans of the graphic novel
will be interested in the other side of this multi-facetted coin that the novel
tells. I hope that they find the world an interesting one, and realise that it
is one that we are all part of.
5. What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
Treat
every project like a race that you are preparing for. Get in shape by practicing
every day (apart from break days). You’ll be amazed at how toned that writing
muscle becomes when you do it every day. Do warm up exercises before starting –
like summarising your favourite novel or film in 25 words (or 4!), or writing a
letter to yourself from one of your characters. These playful ways of kick
starting your writing day can be very useful and are never wasted. It’s
important to have a schedule and a deadline. I have a wordcount every day that
I have to hit. I am realistic (usually) about how much I can achieve, but like
an athlete pushing for a better time, I don’t cut myself slack. This is a job,
and if you take too long over it, you work will be flabby and uninteresting.
Also, shut off the internet and put your phone on airplane mode. Honestly – you
don’t need to go online while you’re writing. Have a notepad beside you and
note down anything you need to look up later (place names, job titles, etc) and
look them up when you’ve hit your count. Otherwise you waste time. Anything
that beeps an alert at you must be silenced while you work. I use a $10 piece
of software called Freedom which overrides my internet connection for however
many minutes I tell it to. Somehow, psychologically it keeps you at your desk
too. Also, important is having faith in the story you want to tell. It wont be
the story everybody wants to hear, but don’t let those rejections put you off.
If you want to tell it, chances are, someone out there will want to hear it. So
don’t be tempted to change your idea halfway through because somebody suggested
it needs a boxing theme. It’s your story. Tell it.
6. Who are some of your favourite authors?
I
read a lot, and I love it. It’s very hard to pin down favourites. If it’s
recommended by a friend, I’ll always give it a go. I love a good crime
thriller, so John Grisham, Robert
Harris, Ian Rankin, Jeffery Deaver, Harlan Coben, Jo Nesbo all feature on my
kindle. Some books really stood out with
me, like Steven Hall’s The Raw Shark Texts, or Niffenegger’s The Time
Travellers Wife. I like almost everything Christopher Brookmyre has done. I
like a lot of the classics, and have recently begun re-reading many of the old
favourites: Dickens, Hardy, Shelley, Austen, Wilde. And of course, I love
sci-fi and fantasy, so I can’t leave out Philip K Dick, HG Wells, Tolkien. Too
hard!
7. Tell us a bit about your time spent as a
producer.
I never set out
to be a producer, but back in the day, when I started out in work, many of the
roles crossed over. I had done a batchelors degree in Scriptwriting, and had
left university with lots of plaudits and a high expectation that Hollywood
would be calling any minute. Hollywood did not call, but then, I didn’t give
them my number. I got my first paid writing job thanks to my university
lecturer, Neil Richards, who had given up lecturing and returned to writing
himself. He got me in as a writer on Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy online.
Which was brilliant fun to work on. While there, I realised that there was an
audience out there, online, who were engaged and ready for drama and
entertainment to be broadcast to them on different platforms. This was the
mid-1990s – a time when people were still accessing the internet via 56k
dial-up – so it was a tough sell, but over the next couple of years I moved
into writing and producing projects for the web. I took some jobs as
interactive producer at various UK television channels and production companies
and before I knew it I was a producer, and not really writing anymore. It took
me a while to realise I didn’t really like it. I took a break for a while, ostensibly
to write, but in the end I just travelled the world and taught scuba diving.
When I returned to the UK, I returned to producing, but this time, I wrote too.
So I ended up making a couple of very successful web dramas which were great
fun and made me realise that what I really wanted to do was write, and not
produce. So I took an offered redundancy package and haven’t looked back since.
Sure, I don’t make as much, but I sleep at night, I enjoy my crazy dreams and I
have time to take my dog for runs.
8. When you are not busy writing and producing.
What can you be found doing?
Apart from running with my dog, I love cooking and entertaining. Either
cooking or being cooked for. We are lucky to live near some very close friends
and have a very casual, but incredibly epicunarian approach to entertainment at
each other’s houses. As I get older, I think good friends are more and more
important. There aren’t many people in the world who know as much about you,
and will still put up with you. Nothing beats those relaxed weekend days of
laughter, silence, good food, wine and banter.
9. What is the best advice you received in life? And what is your secret to success?
While
I was travelling, a man in a bar told me that if you’re going to learn one phrase
in every language, it should be: “My friend is paying.” It’s silly, but true –
it can buy you enough time to get you out of a lot of scrapes. Needless to say,
I ended up buying his drinks that night.
I don’t
think I have a secret to success. I’m not sure that I’m that succesful! I think
I have become less idealistic as I have got older, and less naïve. At least, I
hope I have. I think the best thing to understand is that no-one is going to
suddenly discover you. If you want people to know your work, you have to a) do
the work and b) not be scared of telling everyone you’ve done it.
10. Are you currently working on any special projects, writing or other? Can you tell us a bit more about them?
I’m
working on a series of stories for pre-school children. It’s called Milli, and
it’s about a young snail who is the only snail in Apple Tree Hill and sets out
on a quest to find out what snails do best. The stories are a series of
allegorical tales to help kids understand the value in just being you. Milli’s
adventures are intended as interactive story books for iPads and android
tablets, picture books and an animated television series. The first app will be
released in the summer of this year. The original idea came from the phenomenal
illustrator Jana Schell, and her illustrations are what make Milli stand out.
She’s exceptional. We recently completed a successful kickstarter campaign to
raise awareness, and a bit of money, to complete the app. It looks incredible.
It was quite a departure for me, writing playfully educational works for such a
young audience. I basically channelled my nephews into the characters. Milli’s
best friend is a ladybord called Miro. He spends most of his time clarifying
that he is neither a lady, nor a bird. Throughout her adventures, Milli helps
all of the wonderful creatures on Apple Tree Hill to get over a small problem,
and be better at being who they are, and on the way, she learns what makes a
snail a snail. It’s a lot of fun, and a world away from cyber assassins!
AUTHOR LINKS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT:
Marissa Curnutte
347.574.3136
GERMAN
POWERHOUSE BASTEI LÜBBE UNLEASHES LITERARY PROJECTS, APPS IN THE U.S. FOR THE
FIRST TIME
With
finesse in digital publishing, the company shares stories across various
platforms
After
more than 60 years of success in the European literary market, German
publishing giant Bastei Lübbe is venturing into brand new territory and
launching projects in the United States for the first time.
The revolutionary publishing company is expanding with the
introduction of new book series and digital apps beginning this spring. Making
its American debut, Bastei Lübbe has a strong reputation for issuing popular
fiction titles by esteemed authors and up and coming writers.
Bastei Lübbe has proven to be a master of innovation by
taking on projects beyond traditional publishing. The company is rolling out
its fact-based, cross platform project “Netwars – Out of CTRL” starting this
spring, which includes a graphic novel app simultaneously made available in
five languages, an e-book series, audio book series and several interactive
video documentaries for television and the web. Netwars will be available on
IOS, Google Play, Amazon and Samsung.
“These are exciting times for digital publishing and especially
for our team at Bastei Entertainment,” said head of international sales Colin
Lovrinovic. “Netwars is a great example of how we work. It’s a gripping story
told through various channels, which gives you the possibility to dive
incredibly deep into it – or to just choose your favorite medium.”
A successful IPO and tirelessly working to develop engaging
cross vertical products puts Baste Lübbe in a unique strategic position
regarding the early digital capture of new markets.
Bastei Lübbe is the publisher behind “Cotton FBI,” the most
successful crime series in Germany with 1 billion copies sold. And after only
11 weeks, its e-book series “Apocalypsis” by German author Mario Giordano hit
the 1 million mark for downloads in China. Its “Laura’s Star” app for children
hit No. 1 in iTunes in three separate categories.
Bastei Lübbe is based in Cologne, Germany but will be
launching several hundred foreign language titles over the next months through
its digital publishing arm Bastei Entertainment. The company is the largest
independent trade publisher in the country and a major player in the audio book
industry.
For more about Bastei Lübbe's current and upcoming releases go to the JKSCommunitcations Virtual Tour Page
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