Steven Hall
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Steven Hall is a British author, born in Derbyshire in 1975 and now lives in Hull, England. He has produced a number of plays, music videos, concrete prose/conceptual art pieces and short stories, including “Stories for a Phone Book," featured in New Writing 13 (2005).
His first novel The Raw Shark Texts will be published by Canongate Books in the UK and US and HarperCollins in Canada in 2007. Rights to The Raw Shark have been sold to an extraordinary 29 international publishers, including Canada, the US, the UK, Australia, France, Italy, Germany, Japan and Spain. The film rights have been optioned by Film Four in association with Blueprint Pictures and PathÉ in the UK. Nicole Kidman was apparently so obsessed with the book that she contacted Steven to ask him - in vain - to change the sex of the lead character so she could play him. A short viral Raw Shark Texts film featuring Tilda Swinton is currently in production and is expected to appear just before the novel's UK launch on the 1st of March.
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[edit] First things first, stay calm.
The Raw Shark Texts begins when Eric Sanderson is jolted awake one morning to discover that he does not know who he or where he is. All he has to cling to is a series of letters and packages - which he is warned not to open - signed "with regret and hope" from the First Eric Sanderson.
Attacked in his own home by a force he cannot see and memories he cannot ignore -- including those of a perfect love now lost -- Eric tears open the parcels and discovers he is being relentlessly pursued by a shark that may only exist in his mind, but which stalks him through the flows and streams of human interaction. Hunting the answers as he is hunted, Eric is lead on a journey that will either bring The First Eric Sanderson back to life, or destroy both Eric Sandersons forever.
A daring and unique novel that confronts readers with literary hieroglyphs as well as an intensely original story, The Raw Shark Texts plumbs the depths and dangers of language, the fluidity of memory and the bittersweet ripples of loss.
--Ludovician 16:36, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
[edit] The Ludovician
From The Raw Shark Texts :
"The Ludovician fish is a predator, a shark. It feeds on human memories and the intrinsic sense of self. Ludovicians are solitary, fiercely territorial and methodical hunters. A Ludovician might select an individual human being as its prey animal, and pursue and feed on that individual over the course of years, until that victim's memory and identity have been completely consumed. Sometimes, the target's body survives this ordeal and may go on to live a second twilight life after the original self and memories have been taken. In time, such a person may establish a 'bolt on' identity of their own, but the Ludovician will eventually catch the scent of this and return to complete its kill."
