Many of the books I’ve written have been in Sci-fi, Paranormal or ‘Weird’ fiction categories. This latest one doesn’t quite fit among them. More closely aligned with ‘Atlas, Broken’, ‘do while true’ is fiction, sure, but it’s not speculative. It contains surreal elements, but it’s based in reality. So when it comes to figure out the BISAC code, I really didn’t know where to put it.
Is it computers and electronics? Well, yes, in a way. After all, the whole thing is based around the struggle of the protagonist against the unfeeling machine of Software Engineering, but that’s not really what the book is about. Not really. And that also rules out speculative fiction and its ilk.
So, moving along, the next category is ‘Literature’. If that’s not as vague as it comes… so, yes, it falls under this category, but does it give any real insight into what the book is getting at? And that’s the question that I should have been asking all along. What’s the book trying to tell?
It’s Kafkaesque fable, but the goal is not so much to whine and complain. It’s more to point out where the protagonist had an opportunity to turn things around, to refactor his life, and the consequences that follow. The position he finds himself in is a culmination of the choices that he has made. For those of you playing at home, it might be useful to contrast Atlas, Broken and how the protagonist is a passive actor within the world, whereas ‘do while true’ is the opposite – the path taken is solely the responsibility of the protagonist. In fact, I had toyed with the idea of calling the book ‘do while true – a cautionary tale’ or ‘do while true – a horror fable’. Only it’s not horror, not in the traditional sense, and while it is a cautionary tale, labeling it as such would be too much of a sledgehammer.
Instead, I poked about at the list of possible entries and decided it fits among Fiction – Literature, Fiction – Psychological and Fiction – Family and Divorce. Not exactly your classic Jez-based book, but there you go.
The next question, then, is ‘who is this book for?’, and that is where the blurb comes in. The last sentence I wrote is:
For every developer who has stared at a screen long after the house went dark, and for every partner or child who has learned to live with the cold, green glow.
So yes, it’s for software developers. It’s also very much for the family of software developers. It’s for anyone who happens to find themselves caught in the seemingly eternal conundrum of desiring to provide for their family without the ability to be with their family.
You can find the eBook for pre-order at: https://books2read.com/dowhiletrue . The list of retailers will be growing over the coming weeks, and stay tuned for the audiobook and print version as well. Not long to go now!
