We did it! According to alexa.com, dixienguyen.com is now the 14,305,074 most popular website on the planet. Yes! After weeks of hard work, we've finally broken into the 14 millions!
If we keep up this meteoric rise in popularity, it's just a matter of time before dixienguyen.com takes over the entire internet.
Do you feel that thunder rumbling www.catsthatlooklikehiter.com? (ranked #140,968). That's dixienguyen.com. Be afraid, Hitler cat. Be very afraid.
Hello readers
So, for those of you who don't know, I'm a writer. Yes, I write actual honest to god books and I even throw in a few multi-syllable words to keep things interesting.
Question: How do you find time to write books with all the posts about Michael Jackson and space dinosaurs?
Answer: I have absolutely no life.
But, in the quest to make my life a little better, I need to make sure that my debut novel "Sophomore Undercover" sells some copies when it's released on February 24th. More specifically, I need to make sure that I sell a crap ton of books (little known fact: "crap ton" is a standard unit of measurement in the publishing industry).
Question: And what's the best way to make sure that I sell a crap ton of books?
Answer: By giving my books away for free, of course. Wait...that doesn't make any sense.
Screw it, I'm still gonna give these books away.
While supplies last, I'm offering the readers of dixienguyen.com an absolutely FREE copy of my book a full MONTH before it's available to the general public (author's note: general public = suckers).
And when I say free, I mean free. This isn't "free" like those "free" t-shirts credit card companies give out at baseball games, and then send you "special offers" in the mail for the next fifteen years of your life. Nobody's gonna ask for your social security number or anything. I just want to give you a free book. For realsies.
I just need you to do me one little favor:
The favor: Tell people that you liked my book.
Now, hopefully this won't be too hard for you. Hopefully you'll like "Sophomore Undercover" so much that you'll want to call all your friends and tell them to buy a copy. That's the ideal situation. But, if you hate the book, I'd appreciate it if you still told people that you liked it, anyway. Because anything else is going to really screw up my marketing plan.
So, if you're interested in joining the front lines in the promotional campaign for "Sophomore Undercover" (a.k.a Operation: Ben Wants To Buy A Hyundai) here's what you need to do:
1. Email me at benjamin.esch@gmail.com and tell me where to send the book.
2. Read the book.
3. Love the book.
4. Tell all your friends that "Sophomore Undercover" is funny/neat/the must read book of the year (author's note: I prefer that last one. Just FYI).
5. Join a service organization/cult/health club and make more friends.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until Ben can afford a jet ski.
And as an added bonus, the reader who tells the most people about Sophomore Undercover will receive a special prize. I still haven't worked out what the prize is going to be exactly, but here are some possibilities:
Possible Special Prizes
1. Dinner with Ben (Author's note: limited to those in the greater Los Angeles area. Oh, and we're gonna need to go Dutch. I mean, I'm not Stephenie Meyer. Okay, I'll pay for the whole thing, but I'm choosing the restaurant. You like Panda Express, right?)
2. An original power ballad sung by Ben about how awesome you are (to be posted on dixienguyen.com)
3. A character will be named after you in Ben's next book.
Thanks readers. You're the best.
I like Douglas Coupland.
Author's note: That's also where I eat breakfast. For those of you who would be interested in that sort of thing.
And I think you'll like him too.
So, I wasn't expecting anything like this for a few months, but the first review for Sophomore Undercover was posted a few days ago by Alan Liu over at watermarkbooks.com.
Let's take a look:
Sophomore Undercover by Ben Esch.
Sophomore Undercover was so ridiculously stupid it was funny. The sophomore in the title, Dixie Nguyen (who by the end of the book ends up naked in front of the whole high school), somehow comes up with a conspiracy theory that involves methamphetamine, steroids, and other drugs, that are made in Canada and are imported to America under the cover of a respectable pharmaceutical company owned by an Eastern European (who thinks Dixie is a "homosheshual" and pregnant [he's a guy]), and that sells "cold medicine" to an albino high schooler, who then passes on the drugs to the high school football team, which, incidentally, never wins games anyway.
Also, the book really hammers home that fact that you shouldn't smoke in a large, paper-filled office.
Wow. Yeah. What can I say? What a crazy book. If you're feeling insane or just want a good laugh, take a look.
Wow...reading that review was surprisingly trippy. I think I might need to lie down for a little bit.
Anyway, bravo to Alan for a thoughtful review and for liking the book (Author's note: Well I'm pretty sure he liked it. I mean, "so ridiculously stupid it's funny" is a compliment, right? Dear god please let that be a compliment).
Alan's also got a ton of other really great reviews right here. So, click on over and show the dude some love.
Author's note: the following exercises are not recommended for the pregnant and/or litigious.
Now, I don't want my blog to become any more of a Michael Jackson fanboy site than it already is, but there's something I really need to talk about:
The 1991 music video "Black Or White."
I'd forgotten how insane this video was. Hell, the only thing I remembered clearly was that Macaulay Culkin had a super embarrassing lip synch/rap solo halfway through the song, and I intended to just write about that today.
1991: the awkward stage in American history when a small child pretending to rap was still considered a good creative decision.
But then I watched the full video again.
And was it ever a beauty.
Some thoughts about "Black or White":
1. Holy crap, that's Norm from Cheers playing the father with rage issues.
And maybe I'm just getting older, but I think he has a legitimate gripe about his kid blasting crappy metal music and jumping on his bed. I mean, I don't condone verbally abusing children or whatever, but come on...Norm obviously had a rough day at the office and wants to unwind by watching the baseball game. How the hell is he supposed to get in any quality Norm time with his kid hopping around upstairs pretending that he's Slash?
(Author's note: Slash actually recorded the guitar for this song. Rock and roll! Yeah!)
2. Macaulay Culkin basically murders his father.
Okay, so I'm willing to believe that Norm is like the guy from Highlander and somehow survived getting blasted into the stratosphere by Macauley Culkin's comically oversized speakers, but still, dude lands in Africa.
Right next to an effing lion.
Sure, Michael Jackson and all the tribesmen are around with their spears and shiny gloves and so forth, but they're too busy dancing to help out the unarmed clinically obese man in a LA-Z-BOY recliner.
This leads me to one inevitable conclusion: that lion totally ate Norm from Cheers.
And Macauley Culkin is a criminal genius.
3. This is actually a video about racial tolerance.
I know, crazy huh? You'd think the director could have thought of a slightly more appropriate beginning to this video than a three minute skit about verbally abusing children and murder by lion.
4. Macauley Culkin's rap.
Besides William H. Macy's sex scene in the "Cooler", the most uncomfortable 30 seconds of my life.
But, despite all this, Black or White was actually a pretty cool video. MJ danced with some Native Americans and some Russian guys, which was pretty cool, and there was a pretty neat face morphing thing at the end of the video.
And then the video's over, right?
Oh no.
There's still a little four minute gem that aired at the end of the original video. Something that I blocked from my memory until this afternoon.
Gentle readers, I would like to present the infamous "Panther Dance":
Whoa...
I'm feeling a lot of things right now...
This was still supposed to be a video about race relations, right? So why was he rubbing his crotch and breaking windows? I mean, if you saw some guy outside of your house rubbing himself and dancing on cars, I'm pretty sure race relations would be the last thing on your mind. Personally, I think I would be more focused on calling the police and hoping that the man in the arm brace wouldn't urinate on my Honda.
And why the hell does he turn into a panther at the end? God, I'm confused.
I miss Captain EO.
Suzanne asked: is it true you're really famous in China?
Ben answers: Yes. Yes I am.
The author during his "boy band" period in Shanghai. He was the sexy "bad boy" of the group.
 99.99% of the time, suicide isn't funny.
Karoshi Suicide Salaryman is the other .01%
In this game, you solve puzzles to get your little businessman guy to kill himself. The puzzles get pretty hard, but it's all worth it to get your little guy to jump on spikes and explode in a mist of red pixels and poorly animated limbs.
Play Karoshi Suicide Salarman here. The game is hosted by the fine folks at www.armorgames.com
Then ask him.
benjamin.esch@gmail.com
All questions answered. Really good questions will get answered on the blog.
If you spend any significant amount of time with me I will inevitably ask you four questions:
1. Do these jeans make my ass look fat.
2. Do you really think I'll die alone?
3. I seriously think these jeans shrunk in the wash…you're sure I don't look husky?
4. Have you read any Dave Yoo?
Dave Yoo is this guy:
His new book, "Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before" came out a few months ago, and it's good. Really, really good.
Dave Yoo is my favorite writer in young adult literature, and I think you'll like him, too.
So, the next time you're in the bookstore, I want you pick up "Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before" and read the first five pages. If you don't either:
A) Laugh
Or
B) Feel something genuine
Well then, you're clearly incapable of human emotion, and I just feel sorry for you, tin man.
But for those out there who can experience joy and the full spectrum of human emotion, I suggest that you read Dave's new book. The Amazon link is here.
Still not convinced? Okay, why don't you spend a little time on his website? www.daveyoo.com. I recommend the blog. It's awesome.
Also, his sister is talented YA novelist, ("Good Enough") former West Wing writer, and occasional reality TV actor Paula Yoo (www.paulayoo.com). So, there's clearly something very right in the Yoo's genetic code.
Go check out the Yoo siblings. You will love their books.
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