Adam Bender is an award-winning journalist and author of speculative fiction that explores modern-day societal fears with a mix of action, romance and humor.
Bender's latest novel is Utopia PR, a speculative satire about a public-relations specialist who struggles to find work-life balance while managing crisis after crisis for a dystopian American president. It won the 2021 IndieReader Discovery Award for Humor.
Previously, Bender wrote The Wanderer and the New West, a near-future western about a rogue vigilante who seeks redemption in a lawless America that fully protects the rights of armed citizens to stand their ground. Named to Kirkus Reviews' Best Books of 2018, the novel also won gold for Dystopia in the 2018 Readers’ Favorite Awards and best Western Fiction in the 2018 National Indie Excellence Awards.
Bender authored We, The Watched and Divided We Fall in a dystopian series about an amnesiac who struggles to conform in a surveillance society where the government keeps a Watched list of its own citizens. Also, Bender has published several short stories.
In his day job as a journalist, Bender covers telecom and internet regulation for Communications Daily. He has won awards for his reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists, the Specialized Information Publishers Association, and the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing.
Bender lives in Philadelphia with his wife Mallika and son Rishi. He’s usually a rather modest and amiable fellow.
Learn more about the author at WatchAdam.blog and join The Underground email newsletter for news and info on Adam Bender's latest projects. Follow him on Facebook (wethewatched) and @WatchAdam on Instagram.
What a rush! On Saturday, I pitched two literary agents on my next novel, The Wanderer and the New West, at the Philly Writing Workshop. I also learned a great deal about the query process in a series of talks by Chuck Sambuchino from Writer’s Digest.
I’m excited to report that both of my pitches with agents went well, and I will follow up with them soon. While I can’t say for sure what will happen, it’s encouraging to get such a positive response to my novel’s concept.
Doing all that pitching forced me to hone my one-sentence pitch (a.k.a. “logline”). The Wanderer and the New West is a 100,000-word Dystopian Western about a gunman seeking redemption in a future America where the government has strengthened the Second Amendment and individuals make their own justice.
Hey, I’d read it.
Oh, and I guess this is a good time to tell you that editing is finished! Following two rounds of content editing, my editor Rachel sent me the final technical copy edits. And let me tell you, this thing is looking polished. If you are a writer, I cannot recommend enough the value of a good freelance editor.
If you want to keep up to date on the new book (and get my first novel for free), please join the Underground, my monthly mailing list for fans of my work. I can’t wait to share my new novel with you!
When Adam Bender’s not writing, he’s reading. Or doing other stuff, maybe. I mean, he can’t just be reading or writing all the time!
But I digress (and switch suddenly to first person). Here is a selection of my latest book reviews on Goodreads. If you’re a Goodreads user, please follow me to keep updated on what I’m reading. You can even review my books if you want! The shoe is on the other foot now, eh?
Hm, that’s a weird expression. Oh well. Without further ado, here’s reviews of three books about travel! No, really. Travel. Today I review a classic Bill Bryson book about his wanderings in the UK, a sci-fi espionage novel by Dave Hutchison about traversing the remnants of future Europe, and a much-hyped sci-fi novel by Ernest Cline about flying through space.
I always have a lot of fun reading books by Bill Bryson. He writes in an immensely readable fashion, with great wit that is a mix of British and American humor (makes sense since he’s lived extensively on both sides of the Atlantic). I studied abroad in London for a semester, so I especially enjoyed Bryson’s commentary on English culture in this one. Looking forward to reading his new followup — The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain!
I like the idea a lot. Europe in Autumn is an espionage novel set in a near-future Europe that has fractured into many smaller countries, and things are about as chaotic as you’d expect. It’s a pretty big concept that gives author Dave Hutchinson flexibility to go in a lot of different directions.
Perhaps this is a disadvantage as well — as some other reviewers point out, in this book we have a series of loosely connected episodes and a lot of minor characters. The book doesn’t really drive forward until the end when we final get a sense of an overarching story.
However, in a way I enjoyed this episodic/serial structure. Much like a short story collection, it’s a great format if you’re the kind of reader that doesn’t have time every day to read. You can kind of dive in and out without getting lost, and still feel a sense of accomplishment when you complete each episode. Hutchinson held me with his writing — occasional spots dragged, but there was always something around the corner to grab my interest again.
Still, this book definitely represents a slow-burning lead-in to a sequel where–I’d imagine–most of the meaty action comes into play. The further into this book I read, the more I felt like it was just setting up the real story. With the right payoff in a sequel, I might grow a greater appreciation for the long setup here.
I loved Ready Player One so I was eager to read Ernest Cline’s newest book. I have to say I’m a little disappointed with Armada.
The biggest rule that Cline breaks is “Show, Don’t Tell.” He writes in a breathless, enthusiastic way, but the whole time it felt more like a friend describing his favorite scenes from a movie. Yeah, that sounds like a cool movie, and I might want to go see it, but I didn’t myself feel involved in the scene.
The constant references to sci-fi books, games and film — while fun — occasionally felt like a kind of cop-out. Rather than describe what a base looks like, Cline will conveniently compare it to a set from Star Wars. All the references can also take the seriousness out of a scene. Like, if you’re really in the middle of a war against aliens, are you going to be thinking so much about which movies really did a good job at capturing the experience?
I feel like maybe I’m being a bit harsh, because the book does have a fun premise and Cline does have a talent for mixing geek references into his prose. I have no doubt that younger readers will get a kick out of this. To me, it just feels a little thin on substance, and — having really liked Ready Player One — I know Cline can do better.
Well, that’s the end of today’s edition of Adam Bender reads … If you’ve read any of the above books, I’d love to hear if you agree or disagree with my reviews in the comments below! Or let me know what books you think I should read next!
I felt especially honored today to receive a glowing review of my debut novel, We, The Watched, from Kirkus Reviews, a highly respected institution in the book publishing world.
Check out this amazing excerpt:
Fueled by a brilliantly nebulous backdrop, this briskly paced, action-packed novel is undeniably a page-turner of the highest order…
A deeply allegorical and powerfully thought-provoking dystopian must-read.
Told from the unique first-person perspective of an amnesiac, acclaimed novel We, The Watched places the reader in the shoes of Seven as he struggles to go unnoticed in a surveillance society and discover his true identity. Seven enters a dystopia where the government conducts mass surveillance and keeps a Watched list of its own citizens. The Church has become as powerful as the State, and people who resist are called Heretics and face execution.
I want to address the reviewer’s one criticism about sexism on the part of the protagonist. The reviewer makes a fair point here, and it’s something that I consciously improved upon in the sequel, Divided We Fall, and my writing since then. I definitely take these kinds of concerns seriously, and I’m glad this criticism did not stop the reviewer from recommending We, The Watched as a must-read.
Hope you enjoy We, The Watched — I can’t wait to read YOUR review!
I’ve been blogging a lot about my creative writing lately, so I thought it was time to highlight a few recent news and feature articles I’ve had published since moving to Philadelphia. I’ve been contributing to Technical.ly Philly, Generocity.org, ASTM Standardization News, among other freelance projects.
Full bars but 2G speeds in an auto-rickshaw in Bangalore.
Here’s a neat story I wrote for Technical.ly about staying connected during a recent trip to India. I was looking for a way to use my cellphone while abroad — without breaking the bank — so I signed up for the new Google wireless service, Project Fi.
While I had to contend with India’s 2G networks, the service worked well and saved me a lot of cash. The article also includes my impressions after testing Project Fi back home in Philadelphia.
Credit: ASTM
The science of weights and measurements might sound like a dry topic at first, but I actually learned quite a lot speaking with Canada Chief Metrologist Alan Steele for this article in ASTM Standardization News.
For example, did you know that the kilogram is about to be redefined so that it will no longer be based on a small cylinder of platinum iridium metal? Did you even know it was based on a small cylinder of platinum iridium metal? These and other exciting facts inside!
WordCamp 2015 in Philly
Well, this is a WordPress blog, so I should probably include this one. In December, I attended the first national WordCamp US conference at the Philadelphia Convention Center. Not only did I enjoy the sessions, but I got to interview the organizers for this article in Technical.ly.
The conference was such a hit that City Council declared December 5 as WordPress Day!
THE CAPITAL — You see it painted on road signs and the walls of train stations and government buildings: A black visage with fiery red eyes.
The so-called “Fire Eyes,” dissident symbol of Heretics in the Underground.
This graffiti, done with a stencil and spray paint, has long fueled the Heretics’ hatred for our benevolent government. But until today we did not know the perpetrator.
Today, the administration of President William Drake announced that the Guard have learned the graffiti scoundrel’s name: Ignatius.
“We will find Ignatius,” said a spokesman for the Guard. “When we do, the Heretic will face charges of treason and Heresy. These offenses are punishable by death.”
It is not known where Ignatius resides at this time, and the street artist seems to have gone quiet of late, the spokesman said.
“He will turn up again,” claimed the spokesman. “Heretics like Ignatius just can’t resist. When he does, the Guard will be waiting.”
Set before the events of WE, THE WATCHEDand DIVIDED WE FALL, “Fire Eyes” reveals the man behind the street art seen throughout the acclaimed dystopian sci-fi novels. The story, inspired by real political street art by Banksy and others, makes a great entry point for new readers and provides new perspective to fans of Adam Bender’s books.
Like his novels, this short story by Adam Bender exposes a current political issue in an exciting speculative fiction adventure, carrying on the tradition of dystopian classics 1984 by George Orwell and Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, as well as more recent blockbuster novels like The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.
