Isaac Marion's Old Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 21:21:00 +0000

I have moved all operations over to my shiny new site, ISAACMARION.COM

From there you can preorder the upcoming Warm Bodies sequel, THE BURNING WORLD, and get some unique rewards.

See you there!

-Isaac

WARM BODIES - THE NEW HUNGER - THE BURNING WORLD - THE LIVING

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Mon, 26 Oct 2015 17:09:00 +0000

A few months ago, I told you I'd finished the sequel to Warm Bodies. I told you I was calling it The Living, and then I retreated into the editing cave to read what I had wrought. It was the first time I'd experienced the whole story as one piece, and upon reaching the end, I had a realization:

This wasn't the single mammoth tome I thought I'd written. In structure, rhythm, and theme, it was actually two books.

This is why it took me three years of obsessive 7-days-a-week work, why I withdrew from life and lost friendships and grew a white patch in my beard. I knew it was a big story, but it wasn't until it was complete that I could see its real shape: two arcs, two endings, 900 pages...

Maybe the 900 pages should have been my first clue. That would have been a dauntingly long book--about three times as long as Warm Bodies--but what matters more than page count is how the story naturally wants to unfold, and if the story wants two books, who am I to argue?

Sometimes the baby comes out twins.

So without further throat-clearing, I'm proud to announce the final two installments in the Warm Bodies Series:

THE BURNING WORLD
July 5th, 2016

THE LIVING
2017

I'm so excited. I hope you are too. It's going to be a weird and wonderful ride to the conclusion of this story, and while I'm sorry we have wait another year to get there, keep in mind The Burning World is nearly twice the length of Warm Bodies, so you're going to have plenty to chew on. (no zombie pun intended, ever.)

And to anyone worried I'm pulling a Hollywood and trying to stretch a small story across several installments: nope. This is a huge story. It was always a huge story. It's about people discovering who they are across multiple eras of their lives, it's about isolation and love and the many kinds of death, it's about the animal fears that rule civilization and what it might take to overcome them, a doomsday church and an undead corporation and an infinite ladder to the future of all life. Two books should just barely contain it.

So thanks for hanging on with me through these twists and turns of publishing. Nothing in my life happens normally.

-Isaac

Such luster...such sheen...

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Wed, 14 Oct 2015 01:47:00 +0000

THE NEW HUNGER is finally on American shelves in all its touchable glory. And it’s shiny!

This story takes place eight years before Warm Bodies. It’s a glimpse of R’s first days as a zombie, Julie and Nora’s journeys through the wastelands, and a key moment that set all three on a path toward each other. It’s not just a prequel; it’s a bridge to the upcoming sequel, introducing people and things that will have big roles to play in THE LIVING.

For those of you who already read the Zola ebook or the UK paperback, yes, this is essentially the same book, so I won’t tell you it’s a must-have if you already have another edition–but I will tell you it has a new prologue and epilogue and other small revisions throughout, and also a surprise bonus at the end that has made a few readers squeal. So, your call.

Here is the plot summary and links to buy, if so inclined. I love you all and can’t wait to show you where this story is going.

THE NEW HUNGER finally gets satisfied

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Fri, 28 Aug 2015 18:24:00 +0000

I get it. You're confused. So am I. But it goes something like this.

In 2011, I published Warm Bodies.

In 2013 I published a prequel novella called The New Hunger. I chose to publish it exclusively through Zola Books, an experimental startup that was still in beta and has yet to blossom into its final form.

This was probably not the smartest way to follow up my big debut.

The New Hunger was available only as an ebook, and only on Zola, a brand new, unfinished service that no one had heard of. Even people searching for the book by name often couldn't find it. It was a very, very soft release.

Later that year, a paperback edition finally came out--in the UK. And Thailand. And nowhere else.

Publishing is weird.

In the US, it remained entangled in a complex web of publishing machinations, and I threw up my hands and tried to forget about it while I worked on the sequel.

Now, after three years in limbo, this bruised and neglected novella is finally going to be a real book, available everywhere in the English-speaking world.*

If you're one of the loyal handful who's already read this via Zola or the UK edition, I want to note that this edition has been revised and expanded. There is a new prologue and epilogue and various smaller changes and additions throughout. I won't tell you that it's essential content and that you absolutely must buy another copy, but it is new and it is relevant to the upcoming sequel.**

The book will hit shelves--real shelves made of wood!--on OCTOBER 6.

You can preorder now, before you forget, from any of these fine retailers:

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1PhvQA5

B&N: http://bit.ly/1UOGfqK

BAM: http://bit.ly/1KrIf0H

iBooks: http://apple.co/1UOGXUK

IndieBound: http://bit.ly/1TP7kwH

Blio: http://bit.ly/1KrIrNt

Google: http://bit.ly/1ExRsCo

Kobo: http://bit.ly/1Wz4UBe

Thanks! I love you!

-Isaac

*I'm sure it will get an international release soon, but it may be tied to the release of the sequel. More on that as I get more information.

** The sequel is done. It's called The Living. Still a lot of editing work to do, but the story is there, and I'm so fucking excited about it.

Mutterings from the cave

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Tue, 10 Feb 2015 20:17:00 +0000

Dear cloud of 1s and 0s floating around my head:
It has come to my attention that I haven't said a word to this lonely blog in almost a year. I have said many words to Twitter and Tumblr but some of you are serious professionals and rely on actual Web Logs for your information and to you, I apologize. Here are some words.

I'm still alive (barely.) I'm still writing (madly.) It's almost done (really.)

More words soon.

Warm Bodies sequel update--but real this time!

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Fri, 04 Apr 2014 19:59:00 +0000

For publisher pitching purposes, I was asked to write a detailed synopsis of everything that's going to happen in Book 3, which is kind of like writing the whole book in Cliff's Notes. Everything's there, it's just simpler and shorter. For example, instead of several chapters describing Frodo's journey from Shelob's cave through the Orc fort and into the Cracks of Doom, you'd get, "Frodo simply walks into Mordor."

The end result is a compact little model of the story that you can hold in one hand and examine, and many thoughts occurred to me as I examined it. One was holy shit, this is a weird book. Not only for its contents, which are pretty weird (zombies, semi-zombies, maybe-zombies, ghosts, goats, boats, gaps in reality, and trippy philosophical pseudo-magic) but for how it functions as a sequel. Warm Bodies was essentially about one person's struggle with himself; the sequel is about several people's struggles with themselves, each other, and the wider world and all its broken systems (cultural, political, cosmic). So I always knew it was going to be a bigger book, but now that I stand back and look at it...wow, this is a lot bigger. Not just in length (I'm 200 pages in and predicting around 500 or 600 by the end, compared to Warm Bodies' 230) but in scope. As a sequel to Warm Bodies, it's so disproportionately ambitious, I might be trying to build a space shuttle on the frame of a hang glider. It probably would have been more sensible to start from scratch and tackle these ideas in a whole new story, but...this is where R took me, so fuck it, I'm going in. I hope when the time comes (I'm guessing mid to late 2015) you'll be crazy enough to go in with me.

-Isaac

P.S Just to be super clear, my last post was very definitely an April Fools prank based on all the goofy theories I've heard about what's going to happen in this book. The sequel will not, in fact, be a grotesque mashup of every known YA cliche. Thanks.

Warm Bodies SEQUEL UPDATE! (April Fools prank)

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Tue, 01 Apr 2014 21:03:00 +0000

April Fools prank!As some of you know, Warm Bodies is not a stand-alone novel. I've already written and released a prequel novella and I'm currently working on the conclusion to this asymmetrical, chronologically wrinkled trilogy--a full-blown sequel of foolishly epic proportions.

I've been working on this book for over a year and a half now, but I've still revealed almost nothing about it, not even a title. I've been keeping the story under close guard, waiting for the molten parts to cool before I let anyone touch them, but I'm happy to announce today is the day I'm ready to show it off.

Are you ready? Here it is:

April Fools prank!HEATED HEARTS, the third and final entry in the Chronicles of Warm Bodies Saga.April Fools prank!

April Fools prank!Love can bloom in the most unlikely of places--like the rotting heart of corpse! It's the day before R and Julie's wedding, and all of Citi Stadium is preparing to celebrate their union. But can Julie really go through with it? After all, her dad just died a week ago, her fiancé still craves human flesh, primal forces are bent on dragging humanity back to the self-serving savagery of nature--and on top of all that, she's behind on her homework!April Fools prank!

April Fools prank!But when she learns a startling truth, all these urgent global conflicts suddenly become irrelevant--because Julie is pregnant. But when the mysterious Quinn shows up at Undead Academy, she begins to feel the stirrings of feelings that have nothing to do with the child growing in her belly and everything to do with the fact that she may have a destiny she never imagined as the prophesied Girl Who is More Special Than Everyone Else and also Quinn is cute. Will Julie be able to choose between steady, reliable, but dangerous R and mysterious, passionate, but dangerous Quinn? And what about funny, quirky, but dangerous Marty, her childhood friend who has always been there for her? Or weird, dandruff-sprinkled Bertrand, a guy she met at a party last night? How will Julie navigate this tangled web of romance while also fulfilling her destiny and still find time to raise a cute, passionate, but dangerous zombie baby and update her sarcastic gossip blog?April Fools prank for the love of God!

HEATED HEARTS is an enjoyable, pleasant, and thoroughly readable yarn of bloodless adventure and sexless romance that will capture the hearts of teens and movie studios alike.

.

Send Me Stuff (Again!)

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Mon, 03 Mar 2014 21:05:00 +0000

Remember how I used to have a PO box where you could send me stuff? During that time, you sent me so much stuff. It was good stuff. Funny stuff. Touching stuff. You sent me stuff you wanted me to sign--mostly books but sometimes cards or photos or pizza-stained napkins--and even better, you sent me letters. Some of them were dumb and said stuff like, "I haven't read ur book or seen ur movie but I like zombies can you sign this wad of toilet paper thnx" and I didn't understand why you wrote them. But most of them were sweet and wonderful and made me feel really good, and I probably wrote you back, and I hope my replies made you feel good too.

I closed that PO box last summer because I moved out of my Portland apartment and into my RV and since I was in a different neighborhood every week, I didn't know where to open a new box. It was a dark, strange time, and if I had received your letters and replied to them, my replies might have been grumpy. So I remained boxless, feeling sad as I imagined all the cool stuff I was not receiving from you.

This year, things are looking brighter. I bought my first house, a tiny little 1-bedroom hut in Seattle where I live in domestic bliss with my hairiest friend, Doctor Watson the Cat. I am still a deeply unstable person and will probably run away in my RV soon and disappear for a very long time, but now I at least have a permanent base to come home to. What this means--and what all this drivel has been leading up to--is that I HAVE A PO BOX AGAIN!

The address is:
PO BOX 31548
Seattle, WA, 98103

Send me ANYTHING. I love every object that appears in that box. If you want something signed, remember to include a pre-postaged return mailer.

Also remember that I can only return packages to US addresses. It's very sad, but international shipping requires a tedious process of filling out customs forms and waiting in line at the Post Office and I just have to draw the line somewhere. LETTERS, however, are no problem!

In conclusion, I love you all very much. I am constantly surprised and amazed that you continue to care about Warm Bodies even now that there are no TV commercials advertising it to you, and I hope you will stay with me long enough to read this big, weird, and in my opinion, kind of awesome sequel that I am writing.

Your friend,

Isaac

Book 3 Update

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Mon, 09 Dec 2013 21:11:00 +0000

I'm chuckling today because everyone assumes that the Warm Bodies sequel is going to revolve around R and Julie having relationship problems. Like this story is about dating. Like there isn't a vast and utterly insane world around them waiting to be explored, survived, and saved. I'm so excited to burst your bubble.

Current progress: 170 pages.

Approximately 1/3 finished.

Yes, when I said this one's going to be "bigger" I wasn't just referring to its scope. Warm Bodies was petite. The New Hunger had an eating disorder. This one's gonna be curvy. But despite it being the length of a fantasy novel, I promise that less than 10% of it will be spent describing food and clothing and the carpet in every room.

You guys I'm so excited about this book. I will now run out of this coffee shop and high-five a stranger in the face.

FAQ Update

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Wed, 18 Sep 2013 20:00:00 +0000

Despite the existence of my FAQ I am constantly being asked these three questions, so I think it's time to do some clarification and reiteration of these Greatest Hits questions.

Q: When does the WARM BODIES prequel come out?

A: You mean The New Hunger? It came out months ago, fool! But there's a catch: it's only in ebook form, and only available from Zolabooks.com That's right, it's NOT ON AMAZON. Or iTunes, or anywhere else. Just Zolabooks.com for reasons having to do with anarchy and raging against the machine and supporting intriguing new platforms with great potential for innovation, and so on. This exclusive arrangement will change at some point, because I myself am a paper purist and eventually there will be a physical edition which will probably spread into digital editions on other platforms, but for now: Zolabooks.com

YES, you can still read it on your Kindle, iPad, even your desktop if you don't own a tablet. You just have to download the epub from Zolabooks.com

Q: When will THE NEW HUNGER come out in paperback?

It's of utmost importance to me that physical copies exist, because I know many of you don't read ebooks, and I actually don't either. I want the book on my shelf, sandwiched between Warm Bodies and Untitled Isaac Marion Zombie Novel. ("Book 3" for short.) But the fate of The New Hunger is intertwined with the fate of Book 3, so I won't know exactly when a paperback of TNH will be published until I know exactly how and when Book 3 will be published. I can promise TNH will be published before Book 3, because it will be essential to understanding Book 3, but that's about all I can promise. So if you're in any hurry, I'd suggest learning to love ebooks and heading on over to Zola

HOWEVER: If you're lucky enough to live somewhere in the British Isles, you can get your hands on a paperback from Vintage UK on October 29th, 2013. I know, it makes no sense, I can't...I can't even try to explain it, so just accept this reality, fill your saloon with petrol, check the air in the tyres, drive to the supermarket and buy the book, throw it in the boot, go home to your flat, get a bag of crisps, and read it in the loo while taking a shite.

Q: When will the WARM BODIES sequel come out?

A: It's really hard to project a completion date for a book like this. If I were writing one of those books with the phrase "A [Character's Name] Novel" on the cover, some kind of episodic franchise thriller with a clearly predetermined path, or even a traditional sequel designed to simply repeat the patterns of the original while expanding them slightly, maybe I could meet a specific deadline. But this is a weird book, expanding on the foundation of Warm Bodies in a lot of brain-straining ways and presenting me with a lot of intellectual, philosophical, and ethical challenges that I've never encountered before. It's a sequel to Warm Bodies in the way that Lord of the Rings was a sequel to The Hobbit, and with that kind of expanding scope, there are a lot of potential pitfalls, so it's hard to fathom a timeline.

But, with that said, my possibly naive hope is to finish it mid to late 2014.

That is all. Enjoy the remainder of your life.

-Isaac

Life Isn't Worth It

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Thu, 12 Sep 2013 21:17:00 +0000

All America's crimes in the name of security stem from the belief that our lives are very, very important and must be protected at all costs. This is a narcissistic delusion. Our lives are important, but sometimes bad things are going to happen and some of us are going to die, and this is not a shocking affront to the natural order, it's an inevitability that mature human beings learn to accept.

When you go camping, you accept the possibility that you could fall off a cliff or be eaten by a bear. You don't kill all the bears and blast down all the cliffs in order to guarantee your safety. You take reasonable precautions and then you go out and hope for the best, because although you enjoy your life, you know it's not that important. It's not worth flattening the world.

But America is obsessed with safety. We insist that no one must ever die, and we trample over our principals in an absurd attempt to ensure it. If we could relax our grip on this planet and accept that being here is a privilege that can be revoked at any time, if we could let go of the notion that preserving life, no matter how sorry the state of it becomes, is the great mission of society that trumps all other concerns, then maybe the madness of doing bad things to prevent bad things could finally end.

OOPS 2: Oops Harder

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Thu, 11 Jul 2013 22:56:00 +0000

Hey friends. Seems I screwed up my postal life again. Seems I forgot to pay for my PO box, and seems the box got closed, and seems all your letters and packages were sent back to you.

Oops oops oops oops.

Sorry.

When it comes back to you, please keep a firm grip on your package until I get the box open and receptive again. Then, if you're still feeling any love for me after I wasted all your shipping money...please try again?

Sorry. My life has so many loose threads, it's pretty much a ball of raw hemp fiber.

I'll notify you here when everything is sorted out.

Absentmindedly yours,

Isaac

Mind-Writing (and the Warm Bodies sequel)

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Fri, 28 Jun 2013 23:36:00 +0000

When I write a novel, I write it twice. The first time, it's in my head. I call it mind-writing. I walk around, run around, sit around, I listen to music and look at pretty things and just think my brains out. I solidify what the story is and how I'm going tell it, and then I write it down in quick, loose sketches. When I'm finished, I have an outline of every scene in the book. Not an outline like the utterly useless kind they taught you in school.

I. Useless
A. Fucking
B. Bullshit
1. Seriously

It's more like a storyboard. You know, those comic-book sketches that eventually become movies? I describe everything that happens and explore the mood and atmosphere and ideas of every scene without stopping to actually "perform" the scenes with prose. What I end up with is essentially the book itself, as written by an idiot.

The second time I write the book is when I take these storyboards and convert them into actual prose. Writing prose is hard. It takes a lot of care to craft a good sentence, even more to connect that sentence to another one, even more to transition from one paragraph to the next, and a whole hell of a lot more to tune the flow of dramatic tension so that each chapter builds into the next all the way to the end. You've probably heard of "pacing." It's hard. So is rhythm, emotion, and thematic coherency. All this stuff is hard even when you know exactly what happens in each scene, so imagine doing all these things WHILE making up the story. Even though I always know the basic elements of a story long before I start working on it--especially in the case of a sequel--there is still a lot of detail to fill in, connecting point A to point B, and doing that and writing the prose at the same time is like walking off a cliff and then trying to build a bridge under you. Aka, suicide.

Mind-writing the story before type-writing it frees me up to focus on the prose and makes the whole mountainous undertaking slightly more approachable.

Anyway, this is my long-winded, faux-academic way of telling you that I started writing the sequel to Warm Bodies today. For the last 8 months, since the day I decided I was going to do a sequel, I have been fiercely mind-writing it. (Well, that and finishing up the prequel novella, The New Hunger--which by the way, you are required to read if you want to understand the sequel.) In many ways, mind-writing is the hardest part. It requires the most sheer creative muscle, ripping ideas and images and emotions out of thin air, and it's by far the most perilous, because you can FAIL. You can't truly fail at writing itself; you can just keep editing and revising forever until it's as good as it can possibly be. But you CAN fail to come up with a good story. You can drive your ideas into an inescapable dead-end and give up in despair. That's a very real danger, so the fact that I made it all the way to the end is actually the biggest news I'll have for you until I announce a publication date.

I finished mind-writing last week, every scene from epigraph to epilogue, and after taking a few days to wipe the tears out of my eyes and regather my courage, I'm now diving into the main event. I wrote the opening scene this morning. It's pretty good. So, please smash a champagne bottle against my hull and toss your hats in the air. This ship is launched.

FROM PEN TO PC: HOW DO WRITING TOOLS AFFECT WRITING?

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 16:13:00 +0000

I'm curious how new writing technology--from pens to typewriters to computers--has affected literature over the years. The typewriter allowed us to write faster and with less physical strain. The computer allowed us to edit and revise with a level of ease and fluidity earlier writers could never have dreamed of. Even the laptop changed things, allowing us to break free from the office and desk and write wherever we felt most inspired.

All of these also came with their own drawbacks. The typewriter introduced new distractions to the peaceful repose of handwriting--the noise of the keys, the loading of the paper, and the constant wrangling of the carriage for each and every line. The computer eliminated mechanical distractions while introducing a whole buffet of digital ones. And the laptop put us in writing environments with the potential to distract us even more--noisy coffee shops and the too-hot, too-cold, too-bug-infested outdoors.

Despite the costs, it's hard to argue with the benefits. Today's writers have a vastly more direct, more efficient and more flexible path from brain to page than the writers of antiquity did. But what are the effects? Because there have to be effects. It's impossible that such a radical shift in writing method could fail to alter the nature, style, and perhaps even quality of the writing itself.

As a modern writer raised with computers, the idea of writing a novel by hand--a massive pile of paper covered in wrist-breaking, barely legible scrawl--is unfathomable. Even the thought of typing one makes me collapse in despair. If I knew that deleting this sentence would require a laborious process of markups and notations, and that I wouldn't be able to hear how the paragraph sounds without it until I'd retyped the whole manuscript, would I still delete it? Or would I sigh, "Good enough," and leave it in?

Or--would I be more careful with my words? Would I plan further ahead? Would I approach the chapter with a stern clarity of intent that's foreign to my modern "let it flow" mindset? The completely paralyzed Jean-Dominic Bauby wrote The Diving Bell and the Butterfly by blinking one eye when a nurse spoke the letter of the alphabet he wanted--his only method of communicating. He had no way to edit once he had delivered his words, so he was forced to "write" and "edit" entire chapters in his head before the nurse came to take dictation. It's hard to imagine a less efficient, less fluid writing method than this, and yet The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is a gorgeous book, showing no evidence of the difficulty with which it was written.

When I read a book, I like to imagine the writer writing it. Did he scratch it out with a feather quill in a lamp-lit study with six screaming babies in the bedroom? Did she tap it into an iPad in a busy coffee shop with Maroon 5 in the background? I want to be more aware of the machinery my thoughts pass through on their way to the page. I want to understand my tools and the hands that wield them and someday master both.

Warm Bodies 2: The Soundtrack

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Thu, 02 May 2013 16:45:00 +0000

Music is a big part of my writing. Sometimes it provides the emotional groundwork for dreaming up the story, sometimes it fuels the writing, and sometimes it finds its way into the story itself, but it's always involved somewhere.

As I've mentioned quite a few times already, I'm writing a sequel and conclusion to the Warm Bodies story, and since it's a much bigger, more complex tale than Warm Bodies, it requires a lot of planning and in-brain sketching before I can actually put fingers to keyboard and start writing chapter one. Most of this process happens during long drives, long train rides, long walks, and long runs, with a steady flow of music being pumped into my brain to keep feelings in and distractions out.

Since the completion of this book is in the distant future (Wild guess: maybe mid to late 2014?) I thought I might offer you a little window into the world I'm building via the music that's inspiring it. A little taste of the mood and atmosphere bubbling in my head at the moment. So this is the playlist I listen to during those drives, rides, walks, and runs, imaginatively titled "Writing Mix":

1. "Window" - The Album Leaf
2. "Dayvan Cowboy (Odd Nosdam mix)" - Boards of Canada
3. "That Home" - The Cinematic Orchestra
4. "The Snow" - The Eastern Sea
5. "The Commander Thinks Aloud" - The Long Winters
6. "Terrible Love" - The National
7. "Music for a Nurse" - Oceansize
8. "Deadbeat Water" - Thee More Shallows
9. "Zoetrope" - Boards of Canada
10. "The Mighty Rio Grande" - This Will Destroy You
11. "Down There" - Jenni Potts
12. "Phone Call" - Jon Brion
13. "The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack" - Liars
14. "Takk" - Sigur Ros
15. "Big Red Machine" - Bon Iver
16. "Counting in C" - Jad Abumrad
17. "Start a War" - The National
18. "Tell" - Son Lux
19. "Odi Et Amo" - Johann Johannson
20. "Green Arrow" - Yo La Tango
21. "The Optimist" - Zoe Keating
22. "An Ending (Ascent)" - Brian Eno
23. "Frysta" - Olafur Arnalds
24. "Atoms for Peace (Four Tet remix)" - Thom Yorke
25. "Near Light" - Olafur Arnalds
26. "To Build a Home" - The Cinematic Orchestra

This is a pretty good representation of the feels that will be involved in this book, although it should be noted that there will also be thrills, jokes, and scary shit. Those emotions are not well-represented in this playlist because I don't need assistance writing them. Primal responses like fear and laughter are relatively easy to provoke. Beauty, heartbreak, and elevation are much more fragile and harder to capture, but they are the prey I'm hunting. Wish me luck!

-Isaac

P.S The sequel is not going to be called Warm Bodies 2, for God's sake, or Warm Bodies: Even Warmer, for the love of the aforementioned God. Get a grip, you guys.

Marion VS the US Postal Service

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 22:42:00 +0000

Disaster.

Tragedy.

The US Postal Service may in fact deserve its apparently imminent destruction.

As described in this blog I am in the habit of signing people's books and returning them, provided that they include a pre-postaged mailer. I have signed and returned dozens of books by now, and I just learned a shocking fact. It seems that book-sized packages can not be mailed via my home mailbox. They must be presented to the almighty Post Office Clerk his-or-herself. But since the mailperson is a mindless mail-delivering automaton, he or she gladly picks up all my packages from my home mailbox and takes them away, despite them being undeliverable.

I have mailed dozens of books this way. And since I am a lazy man, I did not write a return address on any of them. Which means that they have all been sent to the Dead Letter Office: a vast, goblin-staffed warehouse located 5 miles beneath a nondescript corn field in Ohio. There, in the bowels of the Dead Letter Office, all your signed copies of Warm Bodies are being creased, dog-eared, and peed upon by goblins for all eternity.

I'm so sorry.

It's a pretty horrible situation, especially since I specifically promised so many of you, "Yes, I really will sign these and send them back to you!" but there's absolutely nothing I can do about it at this point, other than offer my sincere apologies for your loss and promise to do it right from now on. Keep in mind this only applies to books I received more than a month ago, as I have a big box of newer ones I haven't mailed yet, so if you haven't received your book yet, don't panic--it may simply be due to my own slow reply speed rather than any goblin-related treachery.

That is all. Good day.

P.S I still haven't received any cupcakes, n00ds, or powdered diseases. Very disappointed in you people.

FAQ YOU

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 17:17:00 +0000

I've been getting a lot of questions lately in various forms of communication. Emails. Snail mails. Facebook messages. Twitter mentions. Instagram comments. Notes in bottles. Air-dropped leaflets. Encoded cat meows. And many--most--of them are asking the same exact questions. I love talking to readers, but I'm a person who craves novelty and newness, and repeating myself--verbally or artistically--is a painful bending of my nature. Every time I hear myself saying the same words I've said before to answer the same question I've answered before, a few thousand neurons die and return as hideous slimy zombie neurons that shamble around in my brain making me irritable and misanthropic.

So, in order to streamline this process for everyone and prevent me from becoming a frowny old crank in my early thirties, I've decided what you need is a good, vigorous FAQ. So, out of the many questions my existence seems to generate, here are the most common, with accompanying answers fine tuned for MAXIMUM HELPFULNESS.

Q: When does the WARM BODIES prequel come out?

A: You mean The New Hunger? It came out months ago, fool! But there's a catch: it's only in ebook form, and only available from Zolabooks.com That's right, it's NOT ON AMAZON. Or iTunes, or anywhere else. Just Zolabooks.com for reasons having to do with anarchy and raging against the machine and supporting intriguing new platforms with great potential for innovation, and so on. This exclusive arrangement will change at some point, because I myself am a paper purist and eventually there will be a physical edition which will probably spread into digital editions on other platforms, but for now: Zolabooks.com

YES, you can still read it on your Kindle, iPad, even your desktop if you don't own a tablet. You just have to download the epub from Zolabooks.com

Q: When will THE NEW HUNGER come out in paperback?

It's of utmost importance to me that physical copies exist, because I know many of you don't read ebooks, and I actually don't either. I want the book on my shelf, sandwiched between Warm Bodies and Untitled Isaac Marion Zombie Novel. ("Book 3" for short.) But the fate of The New Hunger is intertwined with the fate of Book 3, so I won't know exactly when a paperback of TNH will be published until I know exactly how and when Book 3 will be published. I can promise TNH will be published before Book 3, because it will be essential to understanding Book 3, but that's about all I can promise. So if you're in any hurry, I'd suggest learning to love ebooks and heading on over to Zola

HOWEVER: If you're lucky enough to live somewhere in the British Isles, you can get your hands on a paperback from Vintage UK on October 29th, 2013. I know, it makes no sense, I can't...I can't even try to explain it, so just accept this reality, fill your saloon with petrol, check the air in the tyres, drive to the supermarket and buy the book, throw it in the boot, go home to your flat, get a bag of crisps, and read it in the loo while taking a shite.

Q: When will the WARM BODIES sequel come out?

A: It's really hard to project a completion date for a book like this. If I were writing one of those books with the phrase "A [Character's Name] Novel" on the cover, some kind of episodic franchise thriller with a clearly predetermined path, or even a traditional sequel designed to simply repeat the patterns of the original while expanding them slightly, maybe I could meet a specific deadline. But this is a weird book, expanding on the foundation of Warm Bodies in a lot of brain-straining ways and presenting me with a lot of intellectual, philosophical, and ethical challenges that I've never encountered before. It's a sequel to Warm Bodies in the way that Lord of the Rings was a sequel to The Hobbit, and with that kind of expanding scope, there are a lot of potential pitfalls, so it's hard to fathom a timeline.

But, with that said, my possibly naive hope is to finish it mid to late 2014.

On to the boring stuff...

Q: Why is your blog called Burning Building?

A: This blog has been around for centuries* and has gone through many repurposings. I originally created it to promote an art show I was doing which was called Burning Building, and the name just stuck. The closest I have to an explanation is this odd little outburst from the art show page.

Q: How did you come up with the idea for Warm Bodies / what was your inspiration?

A: When information and experiences love each other very much, they touch each other in a special way and then your brain gets pregnant and an idea pops out. And that's where ideas come from. To put it another way, the idea began as a simple thought: what would happen if I jumped inside the POV of a zombie and just started writing? What would a zombie think about when it's just wandering around, waiting? What would life look like through the eyes of a dead person? So I wrote the 7-page short story, "I Am a Zombie Filled With Love." Later, I realized this concept was richer than I initially thought so I decided to expanded it into a novel, and in doing so, I began to notice many surprising parallels to my own life at that time. I was a depressed and apathetic cynic looking for purpose and identity after spending my whole life immersed in a conservative religious culture that discouraged having any purpose or identity outside of itself. The desire to understand what it means to be a human being rather than a mindless pawn of God, and to meaningfully engage with a world I'd spent my life dismissing became the story of a zombie trying to rediscover life. So, oddly enough, the book is autobiographical.

Q: How much involvement did you have with the movie?

A: I was consulted throughout the process. While writing the script, the director Jonathan Levine would call me whenever he had a question about the story or wanted advice on translating a particular element to the screen. I read two drafts of the script and gave editorial feedback. It wasn't exactly a collaboration, but Summit and Jonathan seemed genuinely interested in what I thought, and many of my suggestions seem to have impacted the film. In the end, it's their movie; it's my story filtered through their vision (and the various demands of the cinematic medium, the film industry, marketing plans, budget, etc) but I feel they were respectful toward me and the story, when they really didn't have to be, since the book wasn't at all well-known at that time.

Q: What do you think of the movie?

A: I like the movie a lot. It's not perfect, of course, and as with all adaptations, there are omissions and departures from the book, but that's the nature of transplanting a story from its native medium to a drastically different one. The tone is lighter and more comedic--R's voiceover in particular is different, more "awkward teenager" than "zombie philosopher"--but it's not at all the crass spoof it could have been. I think it has genuine heart and personality and even retains a few of the themes and ideas I was going for in the book. I look at adaptations like cover songs. It's one artist taking another's material and reinterpreting it in a different style for a different audience. The original is not altered by the cover version. My book remains its own entity with its own separate personality and continuity, and I'm incredibly happy that the movie has resonated with people enough to draw them into the book's world.

Q: Do you have any advice for aspiring writers?

A: Not much, I'm afraid. My road to publication was very atypical and not reproducible, so I don't have any "secrets" to share. I can only advise in broad platitudes and generalities. Prioritize your writing. You can't have everything at once. If you really want to be a writer, be willing to sacrifice some other things in your life--including your financial comfort, social life, and even other creative interests. (I quit painting and sidelined music in order to give writing the necessary focus, and never even considered pursuing a "legitimate career.") Writing a novel should be an all-consuming passion, not an idle hobby you do in your spare time. It seems like every other person I talk to "is writing a novel" but I have literally not met one single person outside of industry events who "has written a novel." I think most people think of writing as a romantic dalliance that is fun to think about and impressive to talk about, but not a tangible reality that can actually be accomplished. Stop talking about it and do it. Don't waste that coal of desire on idle chatter, passing it around the room for everyone to admire. It will go out. Keep it hidden inside where it can burn and drive you and don't stop blowing on it until you've finished something. You'll have plenty of time to talk about "being a writer" when you actually are one.

Q: Who are your influences?

A: I jump around a lot and rarely read more than one or two books by the same author. There are just too many new voices out there to discover. So I prefer to cite individual books rather than whole authors. A few that were significant in the development of my writing are: "The Road," "Slaughterhouse Five," "Something Happened," "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius," "Everything Matters," "The Children's Hospital," "On the Road," "The Catcher in the Rye," "Life After God," "Never Let Me Go," "The Dark Tower (series)" "The Time Traveler's Wife," "Crime and Punishment," "House of Leaves," and all the movies written by Charlie Kaufman.

But having just listed my influences, I have to say I hate listing my influences. I feel like I can never come up with a list that accurately encapsulates who I am or what I try to do with my writing. I think people spend too much time analyzing influences instead of just analyzing the work itself. I don't care who my favorite authors were inspired by or who this band "stole" this chord progression from or what classic movies this movie paid homage to/ripped off. I have a different view of what art is--not a power struggle between old masters and impudent upstarts but a coequal collaborative effort extending through history--so I'm not much concerned with the copyright court of ideas.

Q: When will you come to my city for a signing?

A: When a book store or event or publisher from your city reaches out to me and extends an official invitation. I don't know how to set up appearances for myself and don't want to go force myself upon your population unless they really want me there. If there's enough demand, someone will invite me. (And hopefully pay for my hotel.)

Q: Why do you talk about your cat so much?

A: Because I am a loyal citizen of the Internet. And because he's adorable okay? Shut up. Go away.

Q: How would you describe your relationship with pizza?

A: Intimate.

Q: Are you saying you've had sex with pizza?

A: I have allowed pizza to enter my body. It was a special moment shared between a man and a pizza, and it was beautiful.

Q: Are we still doing this FAQ or are you drifting off into madness now?

A: That. Probably that. Asdfghjk.

A comment on Zola and THE NEW HUNGER

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Sat, 02 Feb 2013 18:13:00 +0000

I want to share this comment from a reader because it says a lot of things I'd like to say but from a perspective more credible than the guy selling something:

I know lots of people are really not fans of ebooks, but Zola are fantastic. Someone there was very patiently answering my emails at 5:55 New York time (on a Friday!) to make sure I got the book (I was having difficulties because I'm in the UK). To anyone worrying about it, don't - they really do seem to care about their customers, authors and books.

Anyway, The New Hunger kept me up most of the night - first reading it straight through and then my head was buzzing thinking about it. It was a joy to get some more insight into these characters. Some things about them really surprised me. It confirmed Nora Greene as my favourite character - she's just incredible. And that moment where the new character gives *that* speech - my hair stood on end (sorry to be vague, I just don't want to spoil it for anyone).

While I was really happy to hear there was a sequel to Warm Bodies on the way - just because spending time with these characters is always going to make me happy - I didn't think it was *needed*. But The New Hunger opens the world up so much, I've completely changed my mind.

THE NEW HUNGER: EAT THIS BOOK

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 22:23:00 +0000

Listen up because this is the last time I'm going to say this.*

I wrote a prequel to WARM BODIES and it's called THE NEW HUNGER and it's available now.

I foretold the coming of this book in my previous post and explained at length what it is (a novella) and what it's about. (horrible things happening to sweet children and sweet children happening to horrible things.) Now it has come, and I want you to read it.

This is not quite the final cover design...the kids look weird...but it's close enough.

BUT WAIT!

Before you go, I need to explain some things to you.

1.
I'M SORRY BUT THIS IS AN EBOOK.
Due to time constraints involved with trying to make this book line up with the release of the WARM BODIES movie, THE NEW HUNGER is just an eBook for the moment. BUT! Paper books are very important to me, as are all the readers who hate reading on computer screens, so a print edition will follow in the near future. I love paper. I love real books. But it happens that eBooks are much, much faster to put out, and this is why you're getting this sudden, last minute announcement for this book rather than a big media parade leading up to the release.

2.
YOU DO NOT NEED A TABLET DEVICE TO READ IT! You can read the eBook on your Mac or PC. There will be instructions on how to do this somewhere on the Zola page.

3.
WHAT THE HELL IS ZOLA? WHY CAN'T I GET IT ON AMAZON, IBOOKS, ETC?

This is the biggest point of confusion, so allow me to explain.

Zola Books is a new eBook retailer, but it's a lot more than that. It's a hub for the entire literary universe. When it's fully up and running (which will be a while; it's still very much in beta) it will be a place where lovers of books can congregate, interact with each other, discover and purchase new books, and have a direct line to the authors they already love. It will be a community that brings readers together and connects readers with authors in a way that's never been done before. There are other sites that do some of things Zola will do, but there is no site that does all of it in one place, and there are things Zola will do that no one else does anywhere. It's like an insane and beautiful hybrid of Facebook, Goodreads, Blogger, Amazon, and Netflix, centered around nothing but BOOKS. No movies, no video games, no paper towels or office furniture, no pictures of cats or sandwiches or lists of your friends' favorite bowel movements--just books! Fucking BOOKS, man!

These things.

Zola is a new concept built in defiance of the massive conglomerates (Amazon, mainly) that currently dominate the book marketplace. Zola is a young upstart trying to change the landscape. It's author-centric, putting most of the control (and profits) in the author's hands and going to unprecedented lengths to connect writers and readers in meaningful ways. It's about giving books a cultural spotlight that currently only exists for music and movies. It's about drawing readers out of their bedrooms and connecting them to each other and to the literary culture stream, and making the experience of loving books a little less lonely.

4.
ZOLA IS IN BETA!
Having said all those great things about Zola, I need you to keep in mind that it's far, far from finished. They're still putting all these systems together, so a lot of the stuff I've described isn't functional yet, and some of the stuff that is functional is extremely buggy. Please give them some grace when trying to buy THE NEW HUNGER, because we are launching this book before Zola is really open for business, kicking down their locked doors and assaulting the cleaning crew. So if you have problems getting the book into your tablet or onto your desktop, please contact Zola and they'll work it out.

5. OTHER NOTES!
Zola is primarily a US store, but they are currently working on ways to take orders from abroad. If it doesn't work for your country, contact Zola and they will work something out.
Unfortunately, Zola can't sell to the UK, Australia, or New Zealand, because Vintage Books is already publishing in those countries, so you will have to wait for Vintage to release it--most likely on Amazon, iBooks, etc.

THAT IS ALL I HAVE TO SAY TO YOU. NOW PLEASE ENJOY THIS STORY I WROTE.

Again, this cover isn't quite finished...the kids look stupid.

*I'm totally going to say this a lot more times.

THE NEW HUNGER

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 23:27:00 +0000

I have an announcement to make.

This may seem a little sudden. I have dropped vague hints into some of my postings and occasionally revealed the truth to random people on the internet in moments of drunken indiscretion. Passersby on the street have certainly heard me mumbling about it while scratching furiously at my neck with one hand and petting invisible cats with the other. But I've been waiting to officially announce it until I could give you some real information, since the mutterings of madmen count for little in this fast-paced, fact-driven new media web 2.0 world.

So here it is: I've written a prequel to WARM BODIES.

It's called THE NEW HUNGER.

It's coming out on January 28th. Yes, this January 28th. Like...next Monday.

Now I'll provide a little more detail to satisfy the media's insatiable demand for context, nuance, and accuracy.

THE NEW HUNGER is a novella, which is like a novel only cuter. It's 140 pages. It takes place 7 years before WARM BODIES. It involves a formative early encounter between R, Julie, Nora, and M.

12-year-old Julie drives with her parents across the wastelands of mid-apocalyptic America--a nightmarish family road trip in search of a new home.

16-year-old Nora finds herself her brother's reluctant, terrified guardian after her parents abandon them in the ruins of Seattle.

A man in a red tie awakens in a forest with a mind as blank as a baby's. With no idea who or what he is, he must unravel the grim mystery of his existence--right after he learns how to think, how to walk, and how to satisfy the mad creature shouting in his belly.

Unaware that their paths are set to collide, these three warped families move inexorably closer, toward an encounter that will change the course of their lives--and their deaths--forever.

I can hear some of you asking, "Why a prequel? Why should I care what happened 7 fictional years ago? Quit stalling and get on with the sequel!"

Book 2 is about the future, but it gets there via the past. People are forgetful, dead people even more so, and confronting these buried realities will be crucial to understanding the world they're now living in--and how they might attempt to change it. THE NEW HUNGER is a necessary bridge between WARM BODIES and Book 2. It sheds a wider light on the landscape of this world. It introduces people, groups, and cosmic mysteries that will become very important. It shows how R, Julie, Nora, and M ended up where they are now, and points to where they might go next. And in my humble opinion, it's just a fucking good story.

So that is my announcement. I will have more news on release day, such as what this book looks like and where you can acquire it. Have a great weekend, and I'll see you Monday!

With much throbbing love,

Isaac

Send Me Stuff

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Fri, 07 Dec 2012 04:17:00 +0000

Dear reading friends: I regret to inform you that I'm no longer signing books via mail. It was proving to be a bigger task than I anticipated and people were panicking when they didn't get their books back for many months and also, I really like doing book tours and if I sign books via mail, no one comes to my book signings and I just sit there alone at my table being sad.

So, I still have my PO box, and I still love getting letters and weird surprises from you, but I'm not going to be shipping books anymore. Also, please no perishables, as they will most likely perish before I discover them.

PO Box 31548

Seattle, WA 98103

Ok there it is. Hoping to see you in the real world someday soon!

-Isaac

EVEN WARMER

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 18:20:00 +0000

The most common question people ask me about Warm Bodies is, "When is the sequel?" I've been hearing that question for over two years now, and it's a strange one. Why would people assume I'm writing a sequel? The vast majority of books don't have sequels. Do they figure that because I wrote a book about zombies, I must be a crass commercialist who wants to stretch out his one hit as long as possible? Cash in and milk the teat dry? I thought about all the writers who have influenced me--people like Cormac McCarthy, Douglas Coupland, Kurt Vonnegut, Chuck Palahniuk, Kazuo Ishiguro, David Mitchell, Dave Eggers, Joseph Heller, J.D Salinger, Charlie Kaufman, Jeanette Winterson, Jonathan Lethem, Chris Adrian, Stephen King--and noted that King is the only one who ever wrote a sequel. And even he only did it twice in a 50-book career.

Clearly, there is something uncool about writing sequels. None of the writers whose careers I hope to emulate have done it--in serious literary circles, it just isn't done.

The thing is, I am writing a sequel.

I can see the reactions now: some smiles, some furrowed brows, some eye-rolls. People have urged me not get stuck in a rut, to move on and explore new territory, because as the above-mentioned Jeanette Winterson put it, "Sequels are for when a writer runs out of ideas."

I have not run out of ideas. I have more ideas than I'll ever be able to write, three of which already have their first chapter written. But as much as I'm pawing the ground to dive into those stories, here's why I'm staying in R and Julie's world a little longer: their story isn't finished.

I wrote Warm Bodies having only the faintest hope that it would ever see publication. I never dreamed that I'd have the opportunity to continue the story in another book, so I tried to make it self-contained. But in my head, I still went ahead and created a big, complex world full of history and mystery and people and monsters and strange things in-between, all moving toward something only hinted at in Warm Bodies' brisk 256 pages. Those pages end with hope on the horizon, but the world that R, Julie, M, Nora, Rosso, and Perry inhabit is still very dark, very wild, and not even close to "saved."

I love that world. I love those people, and I want to show you what happens to them. So I'm writing another book about them. Another book-and-a-half, actually...but I'll explain that later. For now, just trust that I have a story to tell and a reason to tell it, and I'll try my best not to ruin everything.

I love you people. Thanks for being alive.

-Isaac

Jack

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Sun, 14 Oct 2012 16:56:00 +0000

When is Jack in the Box going to delve into the nature and origins of the creature they call “Jack”? His wife is human, but his son is…like him. So whatever Jack is, we know he can pass on his traits to his offspring, which would make him a biological life form. But the improbability of that head—no functional mouth or sensory organs—combined with the way his voice is distant and muffled suggests a man locked inside a giant plastic helmet, ala The Man in the Iron Mask. And his son? Could Jack have inflicted the same imprisonment on his son at birth as some kind of twisted stamp of paternity, knowing it's the only way he'll ever find another human being who can relate with him? What about his wife? Is she his prisoner too? Or is he hers?

Art Show!

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 16:52:00 +0000

Back in 2003 A.D, when I was a frustrated, 21-year-old starving artist struggling to figure out who I was and what I was doing with my post-cult life, I was invited to do an art show at Western Washington University's gallery. In addition to my paintings, some of which you can see on this blog, I created a video installation which was projected on a wall and, in my opinion, really tied the room together.

I just recently unearthed the DVD of this video, and I wanted to share it with you folks. It's crude stuff, and very lo-fi video quality, having been created on late-90s software and moved carelessly back and forth between many file formats and I believe at one point, run through a VCR? For some reason? But somehow it still holds a fascination for me, and if you're a really die-hard fan of my writing and art styles and also very patient, you might find some pleasure in it.

APPLE CARE

noreply@blogger.com (Isaac Marion) — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 16:02:00 +0000

I just had a truly astounding experience with Apple tech support.

I called with a Mac OS question; I won't bore you with the details. I had been scouring the internet for hours trying to find answers to this question, wasn't finding anything, so I finally resorted to calling in. I had never talked to Apple tech support before, but I naturally assumed that I would be speaking to a highly trained expert on Apple products who would know the ins and outs of all the software and be able to quickly direct my ignorant layman ass to the answers.

But it turns out--I'm still trying to wrap my head around this--their tech support is just a guy.

It's literally just...a guy. A regular guy like me, who doesn't know any more about Apple products than I do, digging through websites and public forums for tips from other regular guys!

He has no special training. There's no Apple Knowledge Cube for him to consult. It's just him and I on the phone, scouring the internet, finding the answers TOGETHER.

Isn't that wondrous?

This was our conversation, lightly paraphrased:

ME: Here's what I'm trying to do... [I explain my problem]

GUY: Ok, I have no idea what you're talking about but I'll be happy to help you with it. Let me just look up whatever you just said on Google...

ME: Wait...Google? Don't you like...know stuff?

GUY: Ok, I found something. I'm sending you a link to this article called [how to do something completely unrelated to my problem]

ME: Well, that doesn't really sound like it's related to my problem but you're an expert...right?

GUY: Now, follow all the steps listed in this article from some random dude's blog that I just found on the internet, essentially hacking Mac OS and reprogramming it from scratch.

ME: Wow, this is really complicated for a feature described as "automatic" on the big bright Apple homepage. Ok, I'll try it... Ok, that didn't work. And also, this doesn't seem to be related to the problem I described at all.

GUY: Really? Are you sure?

ME: Yeah, it says right in the title. It's...totally something else.

GUY: Really? Darn! (he really says "darn") Sorry I made you learn Pascal and reprogram the OS for nothing. Well, let me just browse a few more Tumblr posts from 2008 for information...

ME: Hey, is there maybe like a Mac OS expert I could talk to who would already know how to do this through actual knowledge and expertise? Like, in his actual brain?

GUY: (sounding hurt) Well...yes, I guess I could patch you through to a senior representative...

ME: Yes! Senior sounds good. Do that please, thanks.

[He puts me on hold to speak to the senior representative. After about 5 minutes, he comes back on]

GUY: Hey, while I was waiting for the senior rep, I found something new that might solve the problem...

ME: Oh really? Well that's great.

GUY: Yeah, so try this. Go ahead and [do the exact same process he just had me do.]

ME: Wait, I'm...are you serious? That's the exact thing we just did...

HIM: It is? Are you sure you [did the thing I totally just did]?

ME: Yeah, I...I can't tell if you're being serious right now. But that's the exact process I just went through, step by step, live on the phone with you.

HIM: Really? Darn! (he really says this) Ok, well let me put you back on hold.

[Finally, the Senior Representative answers. He sounds sharp and competent. I feel like my ordeal might finally be over.]

SENIOR: Hi, what seems to be the problem?

ME: [I explain what I'm trying to do]

SENIOR: Oh, that's not a problem, that's just how the OS works. There's no way you can do what you're trying to do, despite all the ads for the OS that totally, explicitly say you can do what you're trying to do.

ME: Really?

SENIOR: I'm afraid so. Also, fuck you.

ME: Darn...