Summer 2017 The Silent Second An HR manager finds his purpose in life by moonlighting as a private detective Best viewed as a slide show Table of Contents included to give the presentation more gravitas ID: 562344
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Slide1
An overly elaborate and unnecessary use of PowerPoint to pitch editors for reviews Summer 2017
The Silent Second An HR manager finds his purpose in life by moonlighting as a private detective
Best viewed as a slide show Slide2
Table of Contents (included to give the presentation more gravitas)
PremiseSynopsisThemes
Advance praiseAuthor biographyNext stepsSlide3
Premise (told with underlines because everyone skims)
Chuck Restic has achieved the American dream: a successful career with a large corporation, owns his own home, has the best health care insurance and retirement package…But he’s crumbling
inside: twenty years in Human Resources has pushed him into an existential crisis. He realizes there is so little value in what he does all day…Only when he embarks on a mission to find a missing employee from his firm does he start to feel alive again….This will be his initial step towards
moonlighting as a private detective
…
…
a
job in which he excels. Chuck successfully applies his HR skills to his detective work in an amusing fashion…He constantly balances the inane demands of the office and his new “job.” But it’s worth it because…Our hero finally finds his purpose in life.
A Human
Resources
manager finds his purpose in life by moonlighting
as a private detectiveSlide4
Premise (repeated because you didn’t read the previous page)Traditional detective skills
Chuck’s HR equivalent
Transferrable
skill set
Makes for an unlikely, but
effective
, detective
Source of much of the
humor
in the bookSlide5
The Silent Second176 million people work in corporate America. 86% are miserable. Chuck Restic is one of them.
Chuck is wasting away in a soul-crushing job. As an HR exec, he spends his days avoiding lawsuits. But when he ventures out of his Los Angeles skyscraper to investigate the disappearance of a colleague, he starts to feel alive again.The trail leads Chuck from the shady underworld of Armenian mobsters to the billion-dollar land developments that serve as the lifeblood of Los Angeles. Murder lurks at every turn, and this amateur sleuth needs to find the killer before his name is added to the list.
The Chuck Restic series is a fun romp that mashes traditional mystery with a scathing send-up of corporate America.Slide6
Themes(included for “literary” editors) Slide7
Advance Praise(all comments verified as not coming from author’s family)
THE WRITINGTHE PROTAGONIST
“…a smart, witty, kind, interesting protagonist--not a cookie-cutter guy--a breath of fresh air.”
“… an everyman type character”
“I found him very relatable.”
“Please produce more of your witty, caustic, brilliantly observant prose…”
“…scathing observations of Corporate America”
“He writes with enthusiasm, intelligence and wit.”
“Way above the average detective genre.”
“Different than the usual mystery story tropes with the corporate spin to his thinking and investigation techniques”
“confusing”
“…pretentious banalities and a haughty tone”
“
Meh
.”
“I hope the second book is better.”
THE MYSTERY
THE ASSHOLESSlide8
Author
Biography
(expert in synergistic collaboration… or something like that)
Undisclosed Global Corporation
15
+-year
e
xecutive
at a fantastic company (needs this job)
Only interaction with HR has been on the wrong side of them
Surliness (once a liability) now helping to establish
his
reputation as a “critical thinker”
Lives with his
wife and family in
Los
Angeles
Enjoys reading
classic detective
fiction: Chandler
and the two
MacDonalds
The American University (BA)
Soviet Politics major until the collapse of the
USSR
wiped out the degree
“Studied” at Kiev State University but mostly drank vodka, froze ass off,
and had
ego boosted by beautiful women who wanted to live in America
.
Columbia University (MFA)
Directed two mediocre short films that played in numerous mediocre film festivals worldwide
Fears someone will blackmail him w/ copy of his first script
Segol
Distributing
Placed a generic drug line at Russian pharmacies
Undone by too many crooks
Harlem Methadone Clinic
Researcher at “Lexington 125”
Location of many of his most depressing and hilarious memoriesSlide9
Author Biography (the empathy page)
Key takeaway: Author’s corporate success is inversely correlated to his level of happiness
Starts corporate job
Sits in an ever-growing number of meetings and endures countless PowerPoint decks
You agree to review the bookSlide10
Next steps