Ask the Author: Benyakir B. Horowitz
Answered Questions (3)
Benyakir B. Horowitz
I can express my thoughts and feelings in a way that I've never been able to before. More than working in an office or working on my feet, I feel a connection with the world that I haven't found elsewhere.
Benyakir B. Horowitz
I'm currently working on the story of a newly minted high school graduate who goes into a coma. Partially based on my own experiences, the book reflects the ups and downs of what it actually is like. Before the experience, I sometimes wondered what it was like to be in a coma, to lose the world around you, and, while I would say it's the worst experience of my life by far, I want to relate to everyone the horrors and challenges that come from a non-functioning body.
Benyakir B. Horowitz
It was while I was in Italy. I wrote my thesis on the repression of minority cultures in the Alto Adige during Fascism, and some things really stuck to me. The people had been kicked around between Italy, Germany and Austria and had a lot of baggage from all three countries, not to mention that they spoke Ladino and dialects of Italian and German. They were impure to both Hitler and Mussolini. Their rights were trampled left and right, and they were given an ultimatum: leave your homeland and join Germany (probably to go die on the Russian front) or leave behind all of the German heritage and side with the Italians. One historian said something like 'Mussolini managed to make a population of the most radical anti-Fascist fascists.' It is the basis of Jules Winters' struggle and inability to find a home, and I hope that my readers can find his divided soul in Manual Automata.
About Goodreads Q&A
Ask and answer questions about books!
You can pose questions to the Goodreads community with Reader Q&A, or ask your favorite author a question with Ask the Author.
See Featured Authors Answering Questions
Learn more