Blog Tour - Children of Paranoia by Trevor Shane

all wars have rules

rule #1: no killing innocent bystanders

rule #2: no killing anyone under the age of eighteen

break the rules, become the target
 

Since the age of eighteen, Joseph has been assassinating people on behalf of a cause that he believes in but doesn’t fully understand. The War is ageless, hidden in the shadows, governed by a rigid set of rules, and fought by two distinct sides — one good, one evil. The only unknown is which side is which. Soldiers in the War hide in plain sight, their deeds disguised as accidents or random acts of violence amidst an unsuspecting population ignorant of the brutality that is always inches away.


Killing people is the only life Joseph has ever known, and he’s one of the best at it. But when a job goes wrong and he’s sent away to complete a punishingly dangerous assignment, Joseph meets a girl named Maria, and for the first time in his life his singleminded, bloody purpose fades away.


Before Maria, Joseph’s only responsibility was dealing death to the anonymous targets fingered by his superiors. Now he must run from the people who have fought by his side to save what he loves most in this world. As Children of Paranoia reaches its heart-in-throat climax, Joseph will learn that only one rule remains immutable: the only thing more dangerous than fighting the war. . .is leaving it. 

Book Trailer

About the Author

Trevor Shane lives in Brooklyn with his wife and son. This is his first novel, and the first in the trilogy.


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Children of Paranoia on Facebook
Read an Excerpt of the Book

Interview with Trevor Shane

What inspired you to write Children of Paranoia?

I wanted to write a hugely entertaining series with a nuanced, even complicated view of good and evil.  I think a lot of the really entertaining grand struggle books (many of which I love) ultimately have a kind of snarling, mustache twirling villain who claims his dedication to the dark-side at the end.  In the real world, these struggles are more often between different sides that all truly believe that they are the good guys.  So I open my book with the protagonist committing what, to most sane people, appears to be this horrible act and everything else flows from there.     

What are some of your favorite books?

I try to read a lot of different genres and different authors and try to read both the really popular stuff and some more obscure books.  I loved the Harry Potter series and really enjoyed the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series.  I read, and liked, the first Hunger Games book but haven’t had time to get to the second and third ones yet.  My all-time favorite books, however, have to be Catch-22 by Joseph Heller and For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernst Hemingway.  I’m a stickler for a good ending and those two books have two of the best endings of any books I've ever read. 

Did you have much say in the cover of your book?

The team at Dutton designed it.  They asked for my opinion but it’s honestly hard to say whether or not they would have listened to my opinion because I loved what they did on the very first shot.  I remember telling my agent that I really liked the cover but that I would probably just defer to the professionals on this one anyway (I've always thought of a book cover as more of a marketing exercise than part of the book and I am anything but a seasoned marketer).  My agent warned me not to trust the professionals too much because they often do a crappy job with their first attempt at book covers but that they did a great job with Children of Paranoia.  She was as excited about the cover as I was.  Still, her advice was probably good advice, though I hope to never have to follow it because I hope I to keep getting to work with great people who love and understand my books.

When can we expect to read your next book?

Book II, tentatively titled Children of the Underground, should come out next fall.  It’s the second book in the Children of Paranoia trilogy and I’m really excited about where it’s going to take readers.  Now that I've gotten such positive feedback on the first book, I’m really inspired to try to break new ground with the second book and shock and thrill people by bringing them to places that they didn't expect and making them feel things that surprise them.  I feel like every book is an exercise in setting your readers’ expectations and then a dance between when you should meet those expectations and when you should subvert them.  This dance gets even more magnified when you’re writing a series.   

Tour Schedule

10/11 - Kritters Ramblings   http://www.krittersramblings.com                       
10/12 - Ravishing Reads   http://ravishingreads.blogspot.com                        
10/13 - My Utopia   http://myutopia36.blogspot.com/                           
10/14 - Reader Girls   http://readergirls.blogspot.com                          
10/16 - Mental Foodie   http://mentalfoodie.blogspot.com                             
10/17 - Rants~N~Scribbles   http://rantsnscribbles.blogspot.com       
10/18 - Sinnful Books   http://sinnfulbooks.blogspot.com                         
10/19 - A Bookish Affair   http://abookishaffair.blogspot.com/                           
10/20 - Between the Covers   http://www.betweenthecoversblog.net/               
10/21 - The Fiction Enthusiast   http://thefictionenthusiast.blogspot.com/      
10/22 - Proud Book Nerd   http://proudbooknerd.com/                           
10/23 - Book Hooked   http://www.bookhookedblog.com                           
10/24 - Girls in the Stacks   http://www.girlsinthestacks.com                          
10/25 - All I Ever Read   http://books.nicoleabouttown.com  


Don't forget to drop by the other tour stops for more Children of Paranoia info!! :)