Yes, that one. Anyway, at the request of the author (how good does it feel to write that!) I am expanding on my comment to him - about how I felt cheated by his subtle marketing campaign. Let me explain...
I actually won a copy of this book, and when I did so I was excited! I never win anything you see. But now I see that this was only the beginning of my journey with The Afterparty. From here on, I had already been sucked in to it's subtle 'publicity' campaign and I had technically already entered the novel. This made the fact that I had won the book both better and worse. Don't get me wrong, I understand that winning the book is a normal publicity tactic, but this time it was different.
This novel should be described as an interactive novel for many reasons. Firstly, having won the book and having read somewhere online that it would be out in Spring, I got a little confused when I skipped to the back of the book (I can never help it) and found the section on the back page devoted to telling readers about how they could cameo in the book, get their tweet on the cover, and even review it! Exciting prospects! But I was confused, how could these things make it into a book that was already published and in my hands? Was this book I was holding just a promotional copy? Or would there always be a constant stream of new editions? I'm still not sure on this, but I like it anyway. And you can see how it was beginning to make me think.
As I continued reading, I then began to question everything that cropped up in the novel. Even the e-mails - were these real? Well of course not, but see how these clever clever plans draw you into the novel on another level? On hindsight it was a brilliant trickery, but whilst reading I can see now that I had fallen into it hook, line and sinker, and continued to as I interacted with the novel some more.
Now I hope that this is not coming across as a dislike for the novel. This is quite the opposite in fact, I did really enjoy it. I found that it was so cleverly written that it could send some readers into a schizophrenic episode, and that can never be a bad thing. I have been rightfully and correctly conned of my ability to be a passive consumer, and I have been willfully dragged straight into the world of The Afterparty whether I would have liked to have been or not.
Although it should probably be re-named - "(Free) Publicity"
