Handbook for Mortals

Handbook for Mortals is a 2017 young adult fantasy romance novel by Lani Sarem, first published by Geeknation Press in 2017 and subsequently mass-printed as a hardcover book.^[1] The title became known for its sudden, seemingly inexplicable rise to fame on The New York Times Best Seller list in 2017, after which it was quickly removed upon revelations that the author had purposely rigged the book's ranking through various means.^[2] Handbook for Mortals has since become synonymous with more problematic aspects of book popularity rankings.^[3][4]

Background[]

Lani Sarem is a band manager and self-proclaimed actor, having appeared in minor roles for movies Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (uncredited extra), Jason Bourne (uncredited extra) and Trailer Park Shark (as a woman called "Roxy" who prostitutes herself with the offer of an enticing threesome in order to get her washing machine repaired by a neighbour). Born in Plantation City, Florida, she claimed to have toured as a "rock n' rolly [sic] gypsy" with a variety of bands and musicians as a teenager. Handbook for Mortals was her first novel; while the print edition of the title mentioned upcoming sequels, these have never come into publication. Sarem served as the physical model for protagonist Zade Holder.^[5]

The book, a hardcover novel with roughly 450 pages, was initially written by Sarem, then mainly a band manager and stage assistant, as a screenplay for a film proposal. Sarem rewrote it as a novel, while also still planning an eventual film adaptation that retains a dormant Internet Movie Database page, but has never yet come into any sort of concrete development. Sarem herself had intended to play the role of the main character.^[6] There was initial excitement surrounding the development of a Handbook for Mortals film adaptation prior to the revelation of Sarem's book rankings scam. Promoter Heather Besignano portrayed the film, and Sarem herself, as upcoming icons of feminism, stating, "the film is scheduled to shoot later this year, based on the book. In a year of empowering females within the industry, it's important to note that the film is not only very female-driven, but also includes a strong female protagonist, female director, female line producer and Sarem herself as the author... for several years, she was one of the youngest female band managers with two platinum selling, Grammy Award-winning acts nestled in her roster of bands. Music is another area of the entertainment business that is typically a boys' club. Sarem is no stranger to breaking down those walls and says, 'It's always an interesting challenge to find your place as a woman in a male-centric business. I hope I'm one of the many people that bring about positive change to the film industry. I want to inspire young girls to know they can dream big and achieve whatever their heart desires'."^[7]

Plot summary[]

Scheherazade "Zade" Esther Holder, a twenty-five-year-old woman who comes from a family of folk magic practitioners in a small Tennessee town, decides to leave home in the hopes of discovering her identity and breaking away from an overprotective mother. Zade joins a Las Vegas troupe of eccentric stage magicians and performers, while also forging a romance with several of them. Zade relishes in having most men "constantly fawning over" her, with the exception of Zeb, a magician who doesn't get along with her. While alluring to men, Zade questions the prospects of a "mixed" relationship with a mortal man, and fails to get along with Sophia, one of the female performers, whom she calls ugly and treats with disdain. Zade is a Mary Sue self-insert of Lani Sarem herself, and is described throughout the book as being stunningly beautiful. Much of the story focuses on Zade's relationships with men who are involved in the entertainment industry, including real-life celebrity comedian Carrot Top, as well as a variety of fictional characters. The book ends with a magic show in which Zade performs a stunning illusion but then falls into a coma after exerting herself without her "anchor" and lover, Mac, a fellow performer, who suspected that Zade was having an illicit affair with the elderly head stage magician, Mr. Spellman. Much of the rest of the book consists of shopping trips, partying at bars, and celebrity encounters with various figures. Zade solves the mystery of what happened to her deadbeat father, who is revealed to be stage magician "Charles Spellman" (fictional character based on real-life stage magician David Copperfield). A side-plot features a female character in a Lamborghini who appears to perform black magic. The character, unnamed, only reappears once to visit Zade in the hospital, and is never explained.

Critical reception[]

Handbook for Mortals, sold exclusively through a small press and the Wizard World Chicago comic book convention, drew immediate attention for briefly holding the number-one ranking on The New York Times Best Seller list, outranking Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give, which had previously held that rank for several months on end. It was also heavily endorsed by American Pie actor Thomas Ian Nicholas. Young adult fiction writer Phil Stamper, among other internet users, quickly grew suspicious of the book's rankings, pointing out that it was a rarity for most books to sell more than 5,000 copies in their first week of publication, and that Handbook for Mortals was not stocked by any major book retailer.^[8] The title was then removed altogether from its ranking, and it was revealed that Sarem had bought thousands of her own book in bulk in order to inflate its ratings. Blues Traveler band member John Popper alerted the media in an interview from Entertainment Weekly that Sarem had been involved with similar scandals in the past, commenting, "yes this is weird but not surprising…We fired her for these kind of stunts. Her sense of denial is staggering!"^[9] Handbook for Mortals was heavily criticized on platforms Goodreads and YouTube, being compared to the work of poorly-received self-published authors Gloria Tesch, Ross Eberle and Norman Boutin on both platforms in recorded video and user-based text reviews. In response to her book's removal from its bestseller ranking, Sarem stated, "there has been no official explanation to what happened other than The New York Times reported inconsistencies. Nobody talked to us."^[10] Sarem has defended her behaviour during media interviews, telling reporter Lila Shapiro in Vulture.com, "I wanted somebody’s love story to work out. I wanted this character to have all the things I was lacking, and then live vicariously through her."^[11] Sarem announced Handbook for Mortals, with premature optimism, as the first of a five-book series. The hardcover print edition featured frequent mentions of both more upcoming titles in the series, a preview of the expected sequel, and mentions of a movie deal. To date, Sarem has never published any further titles, and Handbook For Mortals remains the only published title under her name.

Lani Sarem has since also been accused of featuring plagiarized artwork on her book's front cover, Australian artist Gill Del Mace's The Knife Thrower, which appeared to have been quickly traced over and recoloured for the eventual cover art on the hardcover print edition of Handbook for Mortals.^[12][13]

Cultural impact[]

Handbook for Mortals has become symbolic of raising awareness of the dilemma of book popularity rankings being artificially manipulated, as well as authors with the money and resources being able to game the system, at the expense of other authors. After the offending book was removed from The New York Times Best Seller list, it was revealed that "Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give has reclaimed its rightful place at No. 1 on the Young Adult list."^[14] Questions were immediately raised by fellow authors and media platforms about the validity of book rankings, with The Guardian highlighting, "Industry monitor Nielsen BookScan recorded 18,597 sales of Handbook for Mortals in one weekend", a bizarre occurrence, as selling more than a few thousand copies of a debut book in one week is a rarity, particularly if the book is not available through mainstream channels.^[15] The New York Times commented on the scandal soon after the book was removed, saying, "after investigating the inconsistencies in the most recent reporting cycle, we decided that the sales for Handbook for Mortals did not meet our criteria for inclusion."^[16] One year after the scandal, reporter and critic Priya Sridhar pointed out, "In the year since Sarem was busted, she hasn't apologized. She still wants to make her terrible deceit of a book into a film. Her attitude hasn't changed on other fronts, either. She doesn't even seem to realize the racist implications of what it means to knock down Angie Thomas to Number 2 and Nicola Yoon completely off the New York Times bestseller list. In addition, she doesn't realize that Young Adult readers are smart, and can tell when a story doesn't work."^[17] Writer Michael Seidlinger pointed out the increasing commonality of authors buying their books in bulk to achieve higher rankings deceptively, noting that then-U.S. President Donald Trump had purchased bulk copies of his book The Art of the Deal to get it onto bestseller book lists, and that it has been a growing trend among authors with the resources to buy their own books in bulk orders privately.^[18]

Handbook for Mortals has also caused a cultural debate among internet reading communities and authors over the industry possibly acting as a gatekeeper to close out new authors, self-published authors and independent authors, resulting in such unknown authors being more desperate to try and scam the system. Lani Sarem has complained numerous times about the book industry, stating, "I didn't play by the normal YA rules. I didn't send out galleys two years in advance, and I didn't go talk to the people that thought I should come talk to them. I did it a different way. Do you only get to be successful in the YA world if you only do it the way that they think it's supposed to be done? I'm actually hoping that the good that comes out of this is maybe a step toward understanding that maybe this world shouldn't be this tiny little community. People keep saying that they're tired of hearing the same story over and over again. Well, start supporting new stories. Start supporting new artists!"^[19] Sarem has denied allegations of her book scam in initial media reviews, claiming that she was unaware of anybody trying to game the system on her behalf.^[20] Handbook for Mortals has long been listed as "temporarily out of stock" on major book retail websites Barnes and Noble and Amazon.^[21] Used copies, typically autographed by Sarem in black ink, have appeared on ThriftBooks, a wholesale bookselling platform specializing in the offer of vintage editions of books; the title is generally categorized as "collectible" on the site, while brand-new copies are harder to find.

See also[]

• The New York Times Best Seller list
• Small press publishing

References[]

External links[]

• Lani Sarem's Goodreads author profile
• Lani Sarem's IMDb page
• Handbook For Mortals official website