Book Description
HAS NEVER BEEN EXPOSED - UNTIL TODAY
Nanotales is a gripping new style of literature perfectly formed for a
generation with no time and very little patience. In a groundbreaking work
that will redefine the boundaries of storytelling, Ziv Navoth takes the
reader on an emotional rollercoaster ride into the trials and tribulations
of people like you.
Shorter than a short story, a nanotale is the perfect antidote to
modern-day life; designed to be read between tube stations, with a morning
coffee, or at the bus-stop. With no chapters, no page numbers and no index,
Nanotales can transport the reader into another world and back in seven
minutes. We are thrust from the moral conundrum of the advertising
executive briefed to create a campaign for an imaginary war, to the anguish
of the widow faced with explaining her husband's death to her little boy.
Each nanotale is capable of producing an intense emotional response,
whether this is pain, panic, euphoria or ecstasy.
From the Publisher
Ziji's stable of debut hits include Clive Woodall's international success
One for Sorrow which was sold to Disney for $1million, and the worldwide
bestseller, The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury, which topped the charts in
the UK, Germany, Norway, Czech Republic and appeared in the top ten in the
New York Times bestseller list for eleven weeks.
About the Author
DC and worked in New York , Tel Aviv, Cannes and London . The son of a
former Secret Service officer, telling stories became his survival skill.
In the summer of 2003 he went to San Francisco to study under Keith
Johnstone, the grandfather of Improv theatre. When he returned to London ,
his life changed. Acting on the advice of a secret muse, Navoth woke up one
morning, stared into a blank computer screen, wrote for 30 minutes, and
then went on with his life. He did this for 146 consecutive days. The
result is Nanotales, Ziv's first book.
When he's not writing short stories Ziv runs a boutique strategy consulting
firm, serving some of the world's best-known companies. He discovered his
talent for selling advice on a hot summer day in 1992, on a beach on the
Malabar Coast of West India, where he set up a small shop and charged
customers 5 rupees per consulting session. Though he still gives advice,
his rates have somewhat increased since then.
He lives in London with his wife and baby daughter.
Contact Ziv: ziv at nanotales dot net
Excerpted from Nanotales by Ziv Navoth. Copyright © 2007. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
There were 97 advertising executives in the hotel, all competing for
external telephone lines. Their mission was simple: come up with an
advertising campaign for a war that hadn't taken place.
They had 12 hours to prepare, and they used them to call friends, family,
assistants and anyone who ever fought in a war, or simply served in the
military.
The challenge was given by the firm's founder, who over the course of 30
years had built an empire employing thousands of people and serving some of
the most prestigious companies in the world. Each year, the firm's top
executives would gather in an hotel and discuss the firm's results and its
plans for the year ahead. Each year, the chairman issued a new challenge,
and each year 97 or so executives would pour their years of experience into
12 concentrated hours of creativity.
The competition wasn't one taken lightly. The previous year, the winner was
made vice-chairman of the firm in less than a month, and the year before
the winner was given a bonus of over $10 million. The firm's current CEO
won his position three years ago by developing the best advertising
campaign for an imaginary company that sold air (`Because you deserve to
know whose air you're breathing').
The methods used by the advertising executives to develop their campaigns
were as diverse as their numbers. One executive sent a helicopter to fly in
a former chief of staff. Another drove for three hours to interview a known
militia leader who had been imprisoned during a previous war. And yet
another executive meditated with his spiritual advisor.
The winner of the competition was set to be announced by 9am. The timing
was intentional. Executives were expected to spend the 12 hours before the
ceremony working, not sleeping. Their commitment could be quickly
ascertained by even a cursory visit to the hotel's kitchen. There, one
floor beneath the ground, a staff of 15 kept refilling coffee pot after
coffee pot, before whisking them off to 96 rooms.
And with all this activity it was not surprising no one noticed that one
room was conspicuously missing from kitchen's food order log: room 1903.
If one were to peek into room 1903, one wouldn't see much that would be of
interest. It was a spacious room, much like the others, boasting a TV set,
a large bathroom and a king-sized bed. But unlike the other 96 rooms, room
1903 was dark, its sole occupant tucked in bed.
Like his colleagues, the executive in room 1903 was present hours earlier
at the main dining room, where he too had heard the chairman issue his
challenge. Like his colleagues, he too wanted badly to win this year's
competition. But while his colleagues had left the dining room in a flurry
of activity, each running his own race against time, the executive from
1903 went to his room, took his clothes off and slipped into bed.
Sleep did not come easily. He tossed and turned, got up to take a shower,
then another one. But nothing could stop his mind from racing. To lose this
year's competition would
be unfortunate. But to abstain from it would be a disgrace.
When the phone rang the sun had already risen. For a brief moment the
executive in 1903 broke into a cold sweat, worried that he had missed the
ceremony altogether. But when the voice on the other end of the line turned
out to belong to one of the hotel telephone operators, announcing his
wake-up call, the executive calmed down, if only for a while.
The executive from room 1903 stepped out of bed and began dressing. He put
on a fresh pair of socks, a new pair of underwear, a starched white shirt,
polyester suit and
blue tie to match. He looked at himself in the mirror one last time and
left the room.
Downstairs, the main dining hall buzzed with activity. Placards, signs
bearing slogans, and even a small group of soldiers in fatigues, were all
assembled.
At precisely 9am, the chairman of the firm took to the stage and
congratulated the executives on their effort to develop the best pro-war
campaign. It was hard to keep the
room quiet, but the chairman's closing remarks did just that. This morning,
said the chairman, in addition to the winner of the competition, there will
also be losers. Ten
losers, in fact, that would pay for their sub-standard campaign with their
jobs.
The executive from room 1903 lowered his head, as did most of the other
executives. Though each had convinced himself of his own victory, all knew
that their peers were
highly capable individuals. Capable enough to do a job that was as good, if
not better, than themselves.
By the time the executive from room 1903 was called up to the stand, twenty
of his colleagues had given their brief presentations, with three of them
discharged from their positions, there and then. So it wasn't without
trepidation that the executive from room 1903 climbed the stairs to the
main stage.
`If your client had hired you to launch a pro-war campaign,' asked the
chairman for the twenty-first time, `what would you do?' The room was
silent. Each executive in their own mind was asking whether they were about
to see another one of their colleagues lose his job, and whether they
themselves wouldn't be next in line.
The executive from room 1903 remained silent. The chairman, who was eager
to finish the whole event as soon as possible, began showing signs of
impatience.
`If your client had hired you to launch a pro-war campaign,' repeated the
chairman, `what would you do?'
The executive from room 1903 moved closer to the podium, almost touching
the microphone with his lips.
`Nothing,' he said. `I would do nothing.'
