Tuesday, April 18, 2017

Authors To Watch: William Leibowitz, author of Miracle Man & Win Free Book!



William Leibowitz has been practicing entertainment/media law in New York City for a number of years.  He has represented numerous renowned creative people and many leading intellectual property companies.  William has a Bachelor of Science degree from New York University (magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa) and a law degree from Columbia University.  He lives in the village of Quogue, New York with his wife, Alexandria, and dog, George.

William wrote Miracle Man because of its humanistic and spiritual messages and because he feels that in our current times--when meritless celebrity has eclipsed accomplishment and the only heroes are those based on comic books, the world needs a real hero--and that, of course, is Robert James Austin, the protagonist in Miracle Man.

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Title: MIRACLE MAN
Author: William Leibowitz
Publisher: Manifesto Media Group
Pages: 385
Genre: Thriller
                       REVERED     REVILED      REMARKABLE

The victim of an unspeakable crime, an infant rises to become a new type of superhero.  Unlike any that have come before him, he is not a fanciful creation of animators, he is real. 

So begins the saga of Robert James Austin, the greatest genius in human history.  But where did his extraordinary intelligence come from?

As agents of corporate greed vie with rabid anti-Western radicals to destroy him, an obsessive government leader launches a bizarre covert mission to exploit his intellect.  Yet Austin’s greatest fear is not of this world.

Aided by two exceptional women, one of whom will become his unlikely lover, Austin struggles against abandonment and betrayal.  But the forces that oppose him are more powerful than even he can understand.

Miracle Man was named by Amazon as one of the Top 100 Novels of 2015, an Amazon Top 10 thriller, an Amazon bestseller and an Amazon NY Times bestseller.  

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Tell us a little about yourself.
My full-time gig is being a lawyer in the entertainment/media industry.  I’ve always loved the written word and had a sensitivity to language, but in law – it’s non-fiction, of course.  As a writer, I’m interested in fiction.
When did you begin writing?
Miracle Man is my first book.  I’m pleased to say that it’s getting a terrific response from readers.
Describe your writing process. Do you plot or write by the seat of your pants? When and where do you write?
I plot with a detailed outline but the outline is often in flux and is modified.  I find that once I get deep into the writing, ideas come to me that often take me in directions that I did not necessarily anticipate when I did my outline.
Can you tell us about your most recent release?
Miracle Man tells the story of Robert James Austin, the greatest genius in human history (we’re talking 10X Einstein’s brain power), from the time of his birth and tragic childhood through his extraordinary accomplishments in curing diseases.  The book is a psychological/medical thriller with a fast paced twisting plot as Austin battles powerful forces, external and internal, that seek to destroy him. 
How did you get the idea for the book?
I wanted to create a believable modern day ‘super hero’ who is an ‘anti-celebrity’.  I thought that such a person could be inspirational when contrasted with the meritless celebrities that dominate media today (e.g., the reality TV stars who are famous for being famous, but have no real talent).   I also wanted Miracle Man to be the vehicle within which I could convey, in an entertainment context, certain spiritual and humanistic messages that are important to me.  One of the underlying themes in Miracle Man is the sanctity of each and every human life.  As the story of the protagonist unfolds, I think the reader will come to appreciate that one can never predict the ramifications of one person’s death.  Robert James Austin should have died as a new born, but he was saved in the most unlikely of manners; he then went on to change the world in extraordinary ways.  His life was not expendable.  We all are bombarded every day by statistics of death –how many people died in the latest war, or from famine, or epidemic or other manmade or natural cataclysm.  People’s lives are jumbled together by the media as meaningless numbers.  But what I want the reader of Miracle Man to think about ---is the individual.  That’s why Miracle Man begins with the quotation from Scriptures – “To destroy one life is to destroy an entire world, and to save one life is to save an entire world.”
In writing Miracle Man, I also wanted to get readers thinking about a real-life problem that affects us all. One of the powerful forces fighting Bobby Austin is “Big Pharma” which views him as their enemy since he cures diseases and thereby makes many of their “cash-cow” drugs obsolete.  In short, Austin is bad for their business.  Like Austin, I find it incomprehensible that virtually no major disease has been cured in over 50 years.  How can that be the case when so much money has been spent over the decades on research?  Simply put, there’s a lot more money in treating symptoms than there is in curing diseases.  Austin realized that Big Pharma has no interest in curing diseases.  It just wants to keep on selling expensive symptom treatments –and as we know, many people are on expensive ‘medication maintenance programs’ for years, sometimes for life.  Austin wanted to change that.  I think people need to start questioning Big Pharma on many fronts –from the price of drugs -- to why there aren’t more cures.

Of all your characters, which one is your favorite? Why?
My favorite is the protagonist, Robert James Austin.  Unlike him, I’m no genius—but in developing the peculiarities of his character (he’s a complex individual), I was able to imbue him with certain aspects of my personality that work well to make him believable as a flawed individual.  So, despite the disparity between his intelligence and mine, we share certain behavioral traits.
What was the most challenging aspect of writing your book?
 I needed to do extensive research because of the nature of the plot in Miracle Man.  I researched two areas: (1) the nature of human intelligence (particularly genius), and (2) diseases, treatments, attempted cures—and the medical/scientific methodology relevant to formulating cures. Regarding #1 – I researched the lives of actual geniuses so that I could understand how genius manifests itself at various ages –and the behaviors often attendant to genius.  Because Robert James Austin has an intelligence that is unique in human history, I extrapolated from my research and “pumped up” various things about Austin so as to reflect his extraordinary abilities.  So while I highly magnified elements of Austin’s behavior and thought processes –they are grounded in documented realities.  Regarding the medical/scientific aspects of the book, I didn’t want to ask the reader to take giant leaps of faith when reading Miracle Man, so I knew that in order for the story to be credible, it had to have a plausible scientific foundation for the ways in which Austin invented cures and the way that the cures worked.  At the same time, however, I was mindful that I had to minimize the science so that it didn’t bore the reader.
Which authors have inspired your writing?
Michael Cricton, Ken Follet and Daniel Silva.
What projects are you currently working on?
Miracle Man is the first book in a trilogy.  I’m currently writing the second book.
What advice would you offer to new or aspiring authors?
Be your own toughest critic.  Set your standards high and don’t think you’re done until you know that you’ve done the absolute best that you can.

William R. Leibowitz is giving away one autographed copy of MIRACLE MAN, 5 e-copies and 4 pens!

Terms & Conditions:
  • By entering the giveaway, you are confirming you are at least 18 years old.
  • Ten winners will be chosen via Rafflecopter to receive prizes.
  • This giveaway ends midnight May 31.
Good luck everyone!

ENTER TO WIN!







a Rafflecopter giveaway

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