[HarleyQuinn]

Cryptic 'Traveller' has book world buzzing

By Carol Memmott, USA TODAY

He calls himself John Twelve Hawks. But that's not his real name.
Reflection of the times? The Traveler, by the mysterious John Twelve
Hawks, posits a world in which technology controls every aspect of life.

And he claims to "live off the grid." Which is to say, he has no
credit cards, no driver's license, no anything that would enable
anyone — particularly the government or major corporations — to track
his comings and goings or invade his privacy.

And now this man (or is it a woman?) has written what could be one of
the summer's most talked-about books, The Traveler, a hybrid
fantasy-science fiction thriller about (you guessed it) living off the
grid.

"Twelve Hawks is a very mysterious fellow," says Jason Kaufman, his
editor at Doubleday who also edited Dan Brown's mega-best seller The
Da Vinci Code a few years ago.

"I'll tell you what I can," Kaufman adds. "We talk quite frequently,
and I believe he always speaks with a satellite phone ... and a
satellite phone is virtually untraceable."

No book tour. No interviews. Mum's the word from an author whose
novel, his publisher hopes, will make a lot of noise on best-seller lists.

Though there's no hard evidence to confirm Twelve Hawks is real,
Doubleday insists it's not all just a publicity stunt.
The author is a mystery

Here's what we know (or what we're told) about Twelve Hawks:

"He" is probably a man, although his agent, Joe Regal, says Twelve
Hawks uses a synthesizer to disguise or filter his voice. "When he
calls, I know it's him," Regal says, "because nothing comes up, not
'out of area' - nothing."

He's older than 30 and could be in his 40s or 50s. Clues: In a brief
question-and-answer piece e-mailed to USA TODAY by Doubleday, his
publisher, Twelve Hawks precedes the answer to a question about
religion with: "When I was in my twenties " And when an editor asked
him whether his book's "realm of hell" could be compared to current
conditions in Iraq, Twelve Hawks said it's more like Beirut in the
'70s, a remark that could mean he was then old enough to read
newspaper accounts of war-torn Lebanon. But then again, he could have
gotten the information from old news clippings or a library.

He lives in New York, Los Angeles and London, according to Regal,
though the literary agent has never met him face-to-face.

He is a first-time author, not an established author who is writing
under a pseudonym, his agent says.

He doesn't own a TV, he likes wine, and he drives a 15-year-old car,
says Jason Kaufman, his editor at Doubleday, who says he has picked up
those details in their numerous conversations.

"This is not something that Twelve Hawks dreamed up because it would
make headlines," Kaufman says. "Twelve Hawks is someone who lives his
life and values his privacy in the exact same way as the characters he
writes about. ... It's not a game to him."

Though Twelve Hawks won't talk to the media, his publisher supplied
USA TODAY with an e-mailed quote from him about why he lives the way
he does: "The Vast Machine is the very powerful — and very real —
computerized information system that monitors all aspects of our
lives. I live off the Grid by choice."

But is it really possible to live that way in 2005?
[web]http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b343/Regginess/0552152692.jpg[/web]

"It is possible," says Lisa Pankau, a white-collar-crime investigator
in Chandler, Okla. She adds quickly, however, that it would be "very
difficult" and would take "a very devoted person."

Pankau guesses Twelve Hawks could have credit cards with an offshore
bank — if he even uses credit cards. She says he could have a passport
from one of the Third World countries that sells citizenship, and he
could have his agent send his money to a dummy corporation or an
offshore account that is listed under an assumed name.

She guesses he could have registered a car under a pseudonym. As for a
driver's license, you can buy a book from Amazon.com on how to create
that and other forms of identification on your home computer.

Most important, she says, Twelve Hawks, in all probability, would have
needed his secret life in place before the 9/11 attacks tightened
worldwide ID requirements.

His agent, Joe Regal, won't discuss financial arrangements. "But I'm
not sending wire transfers to a bank in Dubai."

Regal, however, had no trouble selling the book to Doubleday.

"It came at a time when I was absolutely craving something that felt
different and unique," Kaufman says. "I had been reading so many
submissions and hadn't found anything I really loved. And obviously,
in the wake of The Da Vinci Code, I was just looking for something
that would be genuinely exciting to work on."

The story centers on two brothers, Michael and Gabriel Corrigan, who
are Travelers. Like their father, they have the ability to travel
between realms — although what these realms are, and where the
Corrigan brothers go, is part of a growing mystery that Twelve Hawks
and Doubleday plan to spread over a three-book series.

The Travelers, whose origins go back to ancient times, are protected
from the marauding Tabula by another group of fighters known as the
Harlequins. The Corrigan brothers have spent most of their lives "off
the grid" in an attempt to outsmart the Tabula.

The novel's underlying theme is that we all are under the control of
the "Vast Machine" — privately controlled and government-owned
surveillance networks that can track our every move and action.

It feels a bit like the Big Brother of George Orwell's 1984, the
government controls of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, and the
authoritarianism of Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange.

"Those are good comparisons," Kaufman says. "But I tend to think of
those books as classic science fiction, and I think of The Traveler as
being a large-canvas thriller."

And what about comparisons with The Da Vinci Code? "The books are so
different," Kaufman says. "But if the measuring stick is whether or
not a novel is groundbreaking and exciting in a way that you haven't
seen for a long time, then I would say absolutely."

Movie rights have been optioned to Universal, and Twelve Hawks has had
e-mail and satellite phone conversations with scriptwriters. Doubleday
is undertaking a major Internet presence for the book, including
character blogs, games, interconnected Web sites (start with
traveler-book.com) and a Q&A with the author.

Quite the marketing campaign for an author who, Regal says, told him:
"The culture of celebrity destroys the value of ideas. ... The point
is to make me invisible."

more at
http://blog.myspace.com/harlequin69

[Serendipity]

" The new Da Vinci Code"

A very good reason not to read it...

The book isn't even out that you got a lame marketing campaign with the "mysterious author". They could try to invent new tricks from time to time.. this is getting old.

[SoothSayer]

I've had the book for AGES and am reading it at the moment.

Not a bad yarn .... but it's really only a book to read on a long haul flight.

I do however object to it being spammed on this forum.

[Kingcoal]

I believe this topic violates site policy as it is obviously an advertisement.