While I like to think that most of what I dream up in my pretty little head is pure literary gold or at least a good idea for a new cocktail, I must acknowledge sometimes I miss the mark. I’m my own worst critic – I really must commend myself for that.
Following are the tentative titles and brief descriptions of five novels I came dangerously close to writing before good sense and common decency kicked in.
1) LMAO – A Novel. A dystopian tale set in the year 2080, a time when, due to decades of excessive text-based communication, only a few humans on the planet still have a functioning larynx and thus are able to speak. The story follows a disgruntled homeless speech pathologist who kidnaps teenagers and holds them captive until they’ve learned to gossip about and bully one another using only their voice.
2) There’s Some Place Like Home. This dark satire of American homogeneity tells the story of a man who mistakenly drives to a house in a suburb that looks just like his house/suburb, and who lives there for an entire weekend before he or anyone in the house (his wife who isn’t his wife, and his kids who aren’t his kids) notices something’s amiss. Everything seems like life as usual until the man, while on his way out to golf that Sunday, realizes (to his absolute horror) the golf clubs in the closet aren’t his – they belong to the wife’s actual husband, who all weekend long has been getting drunk and watching sports at a 24-hour Hooters.
3) # – A Novel. In this sequel to LMAO, spoken language has all but completely disappeared from Earth and nobody even texts in full sentences anymore – they just use a series of descriptive hashtags to communicate. The speech pathologist from the first book eventually gives up and decides to end it all, getting one of his teenage kidnap victims to write his suicide note in the style of the day: #GoodbyeCruelWorld #Whatever #YOLO
4) The Hangry Games. The tale of a sadistic television producer who creates a new reality TV show that takes America by storm. Each week on “The Hangry Games,” ten men and women who’ve been kept in holding cells without food for an entire day are released into a stadium, where they fight to the death for a single Snickers bar. A bunch of pacifist nutritionists who are dead-set on getting the show cancelled lead protests across the nation, but end up getting captured by the TV network’s henchmen and are forced to compete against one another in the show’s final episode. The episode draws five billion viewers, including a high percentage of people who usually only watch "Downton Abbey" or listen to NPR.
5) Flight Club. Fed up with the ever-increasing inconvenience and inhumanity of air travel, a group of passengers starts an underground movement – in the sky. Participants of the movement, called “Flight Club,” meet in airplane restrooms and take out all their frustrations with flying coach by pummeling one another in the cramped quarters. The first rule of Flight Club is you don’t talk about Flight Club. The second rule of Flight Club is you must stop fighting and return to your seat immediately if the captain turns on the ‘Fasten Seatbelt’ sign.
Just because these are among the worst book ideas I or anyone else has ever had doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be huge international best sellers. If you let me know which one is your favorite in the “Comments” area below, I’ll have my ghostwriter start working on the book immediately.
Following are the tentative titles and brief descriptions of five novels I came dangerously close to writing before good sense and common decency kicked in.
1) LMAO – A Novel. A dystopian tale set in the year 2080, a time when, due to decades of excessive text-based communication, only a few humans on the planet still have a functioning larynx and thus are able to speak. The story follows a disgruntled homeless speech pathologist who kidnaps teenagers and holds them captive until they’ve learned to gossip about and bully one another using only their voice.
2) There’s Some Place Like Home. This dark satire of American homogeneity tells the story of a man who mistakenly drives to a house in a suburb that looks just like his house/suburb, and who lives there for an entire weekend before he or anyone in the house (his wife who isn’t his wife, and his kids who aren’t his kids) notices something’s amiss. Everything seems like life as usual until the man, while on his way out to golf that Sunday, realizes (to his absolute horror) the golf clubs in the closet aren’t his – they belong to the wife’s actual husband, who all weekend long has been getting drunk and watching sports at a 24-hour Hooters.
3) # – A Novel. In this sequel to LMAO, spoken language has all but completely disappeared from Earth and nobody even texts in full sentences anymore – they just use a series of descriptive hashtags to communicate. The speech pathologist from the first book eventually gives up and decides to end it all, getting one of his teenage kidnap victims to write his suicide note in the style of the day: #GoodbyeCruelWorld #Whatever #YOLO
4) The Hangry Games. The tale of a sadistic television producer who creates a new reality TV show that takes America by storm. Each week on “The Hangry Games,” ten men and women who’ve been kept in holding cells without food for an entire day are released into a stadium, where they fight to the death for a single Snickers bar. A bunch of pacifist nutritionists who are dead-set on getting the show cancelled lead protests across the nation, but end up getting captured by the TV network’s henchmen and are forced to compete against one another in the show’s final episode. The episode draws five billion viewers, including a high percentage of people who usually only watch "Downton Abbey" or listen to NPR.
5) Flight Club. Fed up with the ever-increasing inconvenience and inhumanity of air travel, a group of passengers starts an underground movement – in the sky. Participants of the movement, called “Flight Club,” meet in airplane restrooms and take out all their frustrations with flying coach by pummeling one another in the cramped quarters. The first rule of Flight Club is you don’t talk about Flight Club. The second rule of Flight Club is you must stop fighting and return to your seat immediately if the captain turns on the ‘Fasten Seatbelt’ sign.
Just because these are among the worst book ideas I or anyone else has ever had doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be huge international best sellers. If you let me know which one is your favorite in the “Comments” area below, I’ll have my ghostwriter start working on the book immediately.
