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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Jun 2005, 464 pages
Paperback:
Jul 2006, 464 pages
Book Reviewed by:
BookBrowse Review Team
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This article relates to The Traveler
Who is John
Twelve Hawks? According to his
editor at Doubleday, Jason
Kaufman (who also edited The
Da Vinci Code), nobody knows
- not even Kaufman. Twelve Hawks
claims to live 'off the grid' -
meaning that he lives in such a
way that the government can't
track him - no credit cards, no
driver's license and nothing
that would allow the government
to invade his privacy.
Kaufman says 'we talk quite
frequently [by phone], and I
believe he always speaks with a
satellite phone ... and a
satellite phone is virtually
untraceable.' His agent, Joe
Regal, adds that Twelve Hawks
uses a synthesizer to disguise
his voice, so it's not even
clear if he is a he or a her.
'He's' believed to be in his 40s
or 50s, lives in New York, Los
Angeles and London, and is a
first time author. According to
Kaufman, he doesn't own a TV,
likes wine and drives a
15-year-old-car. In
a rare interview with SFFWorld
he says that he finds it amusing
to hear how he's been influenced
by TV shows such as Alias and
Highlander considering he's
never watched them!
Whether this is all a publicity
stunt or genuine authorial
paranoia is anybody's guess. However, his biographical details do beg the question - if he truly does live in three
cities in two countries, how
does he get about, and if they
don't know who he is, where
does Random House send all the
lovely money that he's earning
in royalty checks?!
This "beyond the book article" relates to The Traveler. It originally ran in July 2005 and has been updated for the
July 2006 paperback edition.
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