The Pleasure of Reading Today: Non Friction by Morgan Parker

Book Title: Non Friction

Author: Morgan Parker

Release Date: December 31st, 2013

Hosted By: A Dirty Book Affair

Synopsis:

After 12 years, 4 months and 1 and 1/2 weeks of marriage, his wife packs up and leaves with their daughter. So he writes an Indie novel. And it becomes a bestseller. Well, sort of.
His fame brings him the lifestyle of a rockstar, and he has the fan mail (i.e. female undergarments, probably clean) to prove it.
But seeing his fame, his wife suddenly believes in marriage counseling. Their homework: to create something beautiful for each other.
So he writes Our Story, his literary secret-weapon that will win his wife back. But in the process he discovers that true love is more than just ticking the right boxes on a checklist. It starts with... well... }i{ .
Note: the f-word is used 231 times in various formats throughout this story. Read with caution.

Add to your TBR list: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18755640-non-friction?from_search=true

Link to buy:

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/non-friction-Morgan-Parker-ebook/dp/B00GMWJUN8/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1391010601&sr=1-1&keywords=Non+friction

Trailer

Review

This is not your typical book, nor is your typical love story. What this book is is a brilliant story of human relationships and the result of your actions.
Morgan's wife, Jennifer, takes their 4 year old daughter one day and leaves him after 12 years of marriage. Deep inside he knows their marriage was done a long time ago, but sometimes is harder to admit to the truth than to continue living a farce.
After his wife leaves he's left lost, without motivation and trying to figure what his life will be like from here on. That's when after seeking the advice of his neighbor in the ladies department, Morgan decides to write a book. His book becomes somewhat of a best seller and Jennifer comes back ready to try marriage counseling.
In the meantime, Morgan meets Emma, a fan of his book who sends him undergarments (clean, mind you.) Emma becomes his biggest fan and encourages Morgan to want to do and be a better person as well as guiding his writer career to more positive path, they start a friendship that soon crosses that little imaginary line to "more than friends."
In counseling, the therapist encourages Morgan and Jennifer to create something "beautiful" for each other. Jennifer is bitter and mad at Morgan, other than her graphics, there's no beauty on the comic book she creates, only raw rage and resentment; her version of their relationship. Morgan on the other hand, starts writing what he thinks will be the story that's going to save their marriage, “Our Story.”
On the road to trying to save his marriage, he discovers that there are so many different components to life and that true love it's not an illusion.

I was a little apprehensive of reading another book written by another male (yes, I know I shouldn't generalize.) I'm happy to say that Morgan proved me wrong and left me looking forward to reading his previous books.
The storyline, the development of the characters and the human touch of this story is brilliant (yes, there’s that word again, read the book and you’ll understand why.) I laugh (the scenes with his daughter are precious and pretty funny,) I was angry (at Jennifer and sometimes at Emma for not making her damn mind up) and I cried (because if you ever have been through any of the situations that Morgan goes through, I can assure you this story will bring you down to your knees and you will feel his pain.)
This is a witty, laugh out loud, intelligent story; written by a very smart man who it seems to me that, unfortunately or fortunately, understand what real family and personal struggles are all about. Highly recommended!!!

Interview with Morgan Barker

1. How's your writing career coming along now that you have a 9-5. Any more bestsellers in the horizon?

MB - the only writing I do is for our company's financial reports. I hate writing. Look at the mess it caused with Emma.

2. How did you really feel when you were pouring your heart and soul into Our Story and all your soon to be ex was being cruel and a bit heartless?

MB - Jennifer is a bitch, so that part was a given. Once I realized that Our Story was really just my way of reading into Emma, my attention shifted from writing down all of her beauty and other bullshit, to getting laid. And I did get laid. It was the best two seconds of my life with no encore.

3. How's little Evelyn and how are you combining single life with parenthood?

MB - Evelyn is getting big, and not because of the McDonald's. She's growing like a weed. It's not as easy to pick up women in the Wal-Mart checkout when you've got a bigger kid who isn't as cute as she used to be, but the good part about her getting older is that I can more easily set up "play dates" with her friends' mothers. I mean, with her friends... and if their mothers come along, I try to get some play time too. Wink-wink.

4. What can you tell us about Emma? Any more "clean" undergarments sent your way?

MB - No more undergarments (clean or otherwise) in the mail. A few weeks ago, Jennifer left a pair of hers in my mailbox as a joke. Hardy har har. We didn't talk for a week - probably didn't help that I ordered an "adult toy" for her and had it shipped to the hospital where she works. Payback is a -itch, right?

5. Where does Morgan Barker sees himself in 5 years ?

MB - In five years' time, Emma and I will have figured out how to be friends. She'll stop flirting with me all the time, and I'll stop holding this crazy, resentful grudge towards her for fucking up my life. That friendship is important because Emma's friend, Hope, is pretty cute, and I might need Emma to put in a few good words for me (such as how I can help her see stars simply by using my magical tongue). This is all pretty new, though, and I know Hope is engaged and has a "thing" for some other dude in Chicago, but let's face it... I'm Morgan Barker, an accountant AND former best-selling writer. Odds: my side.

About the Author

Morgan Parker is the pen name for a shy and introverted former banker. Because he could never balance his cash at the end of the banking day, he made up stories in order to keep his job. None of those stories was Textual Encounters, which is great because readers will discover a truly unique and original romance that has never been told before.

Interview with the Author

1. Do you recall how your interest in writing originated? What inspires you to write?

When I was younger, I was bused into school so all of my friends lived far away. Instead of making up imaginary friends, I wrote stories about people. Today, I write because I like making stuff up. It's an escape for me.

2.Is there a topic you refuse to write about? Is there a theme or idea you would like to bring to life?

I refuse to write about child abuse. I think it's an unfair way to get a reader involved emotionally and we simply read too much about that stuff in the media. I'd rather highlight the fun aspects of children, the pieces we don't hear about so much.

I will be digging into the area of cognitive sciences (sleep) in a future project. It's an interesting love story.

3. When you hear from your readers, what do they say? How do you react to negative criticism?

Most of my readers are thankful for my stories, which leads me to believe they've written the wrong writer. But after determining that they liked my stories, or one of them, I'm happy to chat and hear their feedback! It's always good to get criticism, especially the negative stuff because it keep writers accountable to their readers. As writers, we often think we're "selling books," but we're not... we're telling stories and engaging with our readers. If there's anything "sell," it's who we are as writers, what we write about and how we write it. People often forget that...

4. What is something that readers don't know about your main character in Non Friction?

I think most people forget that Non Friction is written from that main character's point of view. Like most of us, when we tell a story, we add our own biases. Only a few people have said "there's a reason his wife walked out on him." And that's the truth - there's a reason. It's not necessarily a nice reason because I think it takes A LOT for a wife to leave her husband. So, like me, readers don't know what was so awful about the main character for his wife to leave. And that's probably a good thing!

5. Do you have any writing quirks?

I like writing alone, with a movie or music videos playing in the background. That's about as quirky as it gets with me. I'm not naked or drunk/high when I write. I'm boring that way...

6. Why did you choose to use a pen name to publish your books instead of your real name?

Choosing a pen name was a very deliberate move on my part. My real name is not as sexy as Morgan Parker, plus if Textual Encounters (my first novella) sucked, I didn't want it associated with the "real" me. Also, like 90% of writers that I know, I write for my family: Morgan Parker is made up of the my children's middle names. It's for them (minus the swearing, adultery and sex).

7. Do you have any author events schedule (when and where,) and will you attend or will you send the lovely Amy in your place?

At this point, I don't have any author events scheduled. However, I plan on being in Vegas during that big Vegas one and I hope to have a few parties with the fans I poach from other writers who were actually accepted into the venue! Yes, Amy will be there. So, if you're going to be in Vegas, remember that Morgan Parker will be there too. Somewhere.

A few crazy questions...

1. Do you sing in the shower?

Nope. I sing in the car when I'm all alone.

2. Do you think it's harder for a man to write about sex than it is for a woman?

Yes. I had a woman teach me how to write a sex scene. We won't discuss how easily those emails can lead to a huge misunderstanding between spouses. But I'll say this: oops.

3. Do you ever write naked?

Not on purpose. I think I've signed on while waiting for my wife to finish in the shower one morning and ended up writing a full paragraph instead of a couple of one-liners, but again, that wasn't on purpose. So I apologize to my readers for that one.

4. As a child, what did you want to do when you grew up?

A writer. When I was a child, Stephen King was the only writer out there and he wrote 1 book/year, sometimes 2. What did he do with the other 10 months of the year with all of that money and time? (I later found out he snorted a lot of coke, which would not have appealed to me).