Author Howard D.
Baker Title: Simon Finds His Voice.
Genre: Fiction/ Contemporary/ Humor Summary: Simon Matthews is a high-tech genius and the world's greatest computer hacker who's afraid he is slowly losing his mind.
Simon's new Smartphone has a personal assistant application.
She gives him directions and reminders like any good computer assistant would, but she's having real conversations with Simon and claims to be in love with him.
Maybe he's only tripping on the drugs his psycho-psychiatrist prescribed, or perhaps his sanity truly is in question.
After hitting a cold spot in his marriage, he fires up a hot phone-sex affair with the new female virtual assistant.
However, when Simon tries to push the strange relationship further, she refuses to meet with him in person.
When he uses his resources to set off and find the woman behind the seductive voice on his Smartphone, things really get messy and he finds himself in some weird trouble.
At the same time he embarks on his daring romantic adventure, someone is hacking into his finances and ripping him off of millions of dollars.
Simon's world is now quickly spinning out of control.
Review: Set in the modern-day, the characters are wonderfully unique, and the story is loaded with twists and turns.
Nothing is as it appears and the tears will stream down your face as you laugh out loud.
To say that this book is entertaining is an understatement of mammoth proportion.
The story line is well thought out, and the character development is fantastic and multi-dimensional.
You will find yourself turning each page in a desperate attempt to find out what will happen next to the main character, only to witness the plot change once again.
Simply a remarkable story; one that will have you waiting in anticipation for the next installment.
About the Author: After reading Simon Finds His Voice, I had the opportunity to talk with Mr.
Baker, and it quickly became apparent where the creative inspiration originates.
Mr.
Baker is not only an author; he is also an accomplished actor with credits in the areas of theater, film, and television.
However, it does not stop there.
In addition, Baker enjoys a career in voice-over work on local and national radio and is a licensed private pilot to boot.
Having the chance to ask Baker several questions, I, like many of his readers, wanted to know more about some of the basics behind the main character and his inspiration for the book.
The first question I asked was: How did the main character come about? He is a very unique individual and is easy to like.
"I had just gotten an iPhone with Siri, and I thought it would be fun to do a story about some guy falling in love with a Siri-type voice.
At first I was thinking about a screenplay, but I soon realized that the novelty of Siri would be long over by the time I got something written, much less pitched and produced.
I really wanted the two of them to finally meet, and I needed some kind of hook to carry the story to its conclusion.
Just him meeting her wouldn't get the job done.
So I had to make her voice just a part of the story, not the center of it.
Instead, I gave Simon's life center stage and made the story bigger than that one premise.
Once I had made that choice, I knew he would have to be unusual in some way so that his 'relationship' with his phone would appear suspect.
Then, he just started falling into place for me.
" My next question was no mystery.
Would there be another Simon Mathews book? "In earlier drafts of Simon Finds His Voice, I had a subplot going.
But a friend of mine suggested the premise of the subplot should be another book.
So there will be another Simon book.
I already have about thirty pages.
I have a lot on my plate right now, so it's going to take some time.
But, yeah, I want to do at least one more.
" Having Mr.
Baker at my disposal, I was also interested to know what inspired him to write the book.
"I've always enjoyed writing, but during the first several drafts of this book, I didn't feel the story was going in the right direction and I almost abandoned it.
But then I started focusing on Simon.
Once Simon started to take shape in my notes, I started finding a better direction.
I became committed to getting the story told.
Really, the character of Simon inspired me.
" Since we were on the topic, I was curious to know what else he was working on now and what he had planned in the future.
"In addition to writing, I'm also an actor and voice-over talent, working under the stage name 'Jeff' Baker.
On my acting website, actor-pro.
com, I have my voice-over demos.
I've got an idea for a project to include those demos, but I want to keep that one to myself for now.
Voice over is a very competitive business.
I also have a stage-play script going, titled Blessed Civility.
It's a fictional, dark comedy about an aging Civil War veteran.
I've done about ten drafts.
It's at the point where it needs a reading to take it to the next level.
For anyone who might be curious, the first scene is on howarddbaker.
com.
" After thanking Mr.
Baker for taking time out of his busy schedule, I made him promise that I would receive an advance copy of his next book.
Howard D.
Baker is a talented author that will no doubt be rising up the charts quickly.
His book is just under the 200 pages, based on a print format and is available at Amazon in Ebook format.