You might remember James Frey as the man who wrote A Million Little Pieces, an autobiography of sorts about his battle with drug addiction. Frey was later criticized for fabricating parts of his memoir, including but not limited to a train-car wreck that was central to the book itself. Anyway, that same James Frey is now CEO of Full Fathom Five, a company responsible for a book series called “The Lorien Legacies.” The success there has propelled Frey into something much bigger.
On Tuesday, Frey released “Endgame: The Calling.” The book follows “12 young adults from India to America decoding their own sets of puzzles on a worldwide scavenger hunt to find hidden objects and save the Earth from total destruction by alien forces.” Yes, it’s a mouthful but in short, it’s an interactive book. Readers have a chance to follow clues in the story to unlock a case of gold coins at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. All in all, the gold totals $500,000.
Here’s Frey with more:
“Anybody in the world can win it,” says Frey, 45, in a telephone interview from Connecticut, where he lives with his family and runs his production company Full Fathom Five. “We will know when somebody has solved the puzzle and we will make sure he is in a position to get to Caesars Palace.”
“I want to do it because I think it’s cool. I want to see what happens. I want to do something no one has ever done before,” Frey says.
It doesn’t end there either. “Endgame: The Calling” is part of a trilogy and the second book will have a $1 million prize and the third $1.5 million. Along with the series, Endgame has an online mobile app that allows users to fight others for more puzzle clues. Basically, it’s a real life Hunger Games.
Let’s hope no one ends up dead here because seriously, I can totally see that happening.
[Asia One]