William Campbell Powell is a new young adult author whose debut novel, Expiration Day due out on April 1. Powell's book was bought out of the "slush pile" — the pile of unsolicited manuscripts that arrive at publishers by the truckload – at Tor Books and I read it a year ago to give it a jacket quote, and really enjoyed it.
Powell came by my office a couple weeks ago to talk about the book, and we had a great chat that's been mixed down to a smart seven minutes. I hope you enjoy this — and look for my review of Expiration Day on April 1. Here's a bit of it:
Expiration Day is William Campbell Powell's debut YA novel, and it's an exciting start. The novel is set in a world in which human fertility has collapsed, taking the birth-rate virtually to zero, sparking riots and even a limited nuclear war as the human race realizes that it may be in its last days. Order is restored, but at the price of basic civil liberties. There's a little bit of Orwell (a heavily surveilled and censored Internet); but mostly, it's all about the Huxley. The major locus of control is a line of robotic children — all but indistinguishable from flesh-and-bloods, even to themselves — who are sold to desperate couples as surrogates for the children they can't have, calming the existential panic and creating a surface veneer of normalcy.
Cory Doctorow and William Campbell Powell on the YA Experience
