The United States is long dead, basic resources are getting scarcer, and no one on Earth has seen the stars [in years]. Vast tracts of the country are now empty as people huddle together for safety.

Sam Cooper is seventeen. He drives a cherry red 1968 GTO that he won on a bet, and spends his days exploring the open roads of the great American West. He should be living the teenage dream, but post-collapse America is a hard place to survive.

The United States is long dead, basic resources are getting scarcer,
and no one on Earth has seen the stars since before he was born. Vast tracts of the country are now empty as people huddle together for safety.

In all this chaos, Sam has survived on his wits and occasional luck. But a visit to the walled and prosperous Century City results in a split-second decision that changes everything. Soon Sam is on the run from the ruthless Carolyn Bast, and by something much more dangerous: MUTHA—a powerful artificial entity that has been watching and waiting for Sam’s return from the barren outlands. Sam unknowingly carries the key to something MUTHA can’t live without, something so dangerous that others are willing to kill him, or worse, to ensure that the great plex never possesses it.

Sam can’t stay one step ahead of them forever. His only hope is to unravel the secrets of his peculiar past and awaken the incredible power that sleeps within—because even in his beloved GTO, without the truth, Sam will never succeed in outracing the nightmare to come.

That sounds so exciting. What genre is it?
Science Fiction.

What kind of readers will it appeal to?
Well, I started writing it because of the shortage of books for teenage boys. My publisher and agent (and practically everyone else in the business) told me that “boys over the age of 12 don’t read.” Nonsense. So initially my intended audience was teenage boys, but it turned out that adults seem to really like it as well. And girls. Although fans of paranormal romance has complained that it’s “too complicated,” and that “there is too much science.” So probably not
them!

There are enough books out there, and even on this site, for them.
Complete this sentence for us: if you like _________________, you’ll love Paradigm.
If you like Doctor Who, and science fiction that is fast moving with a sense of humor, you’ll love my book.

Tell us more about Sam Cooper.
Sam Cooper has lived in the Wilds since he was five. He knows that his parents were scientists for a giant corporation in San Francisco but that is all, and they are gone now. He reads constantly and travels the Wilds trading food and fuel for small household appliances that he finds and repairs. He thinks his parents escaped to the Wilds because of something they had done, but he is wrong. He has a biting sense of humor and an almost self-destructive desire to do the right thing.

Any girls in the story?
Alma Kaahu is the last of a proud warrior race. She is Maori and the only survivor of the Great Antipodean War. She lost everyone she loved and her beautiful country is a wasteland, but she conceals her feelings deep inside. Sam can’t read her, but assumes she at least kind of likes him, as she keeps risking her life for his.

How would you like the reader to feel as they read the last word of your book?
I’d like them to want a sequel. It was intended as a one-off, but people keep asking me what happens next. One guy (a college student) wanted to phone me and discuss his ideas. I said yes, and we had a really fantastic conversation about it. That’s the stuff that makes it all worthwhile!

Wow, that’s even better than a five star review!
Is there a story behind the title of the book?
My father was a very prominent scientist who worked in the field of energy research. He was also involved in carbon sequestration, string theory and nanotechnology and wrote books about chaos theory as it related to energy. Sadly, he is now in the advanced stages of dementia, but he and I used to talk about PARADIGM all the time. He came up with many of the acronyms (scientists love acronyms!), including the Molecular Universal Tertiary Hyperspatial
Analogicon. There was a rationale behind all of them.

At the center of the novel is the mysterious Paradigm Device. He thought that one up because he hated how overused the word had become. But it does reflect the function of the box as well.

We’re sorry to hear that about your father. Sounds like he was a fascinating man before his illness.
Tell us a bit about yourself.
I grew up in Liverpool, England, where I was fascinated by history and film. Both my sister and I were raised in a home where science fiction was everywhere. My father had an extensive collection of books and we watched practically everything scifi that was broadcast on TV. I moved to the US to go to film school, attending the American Film Institute Center for Advanced Film and Television Studies (CAFTS) as a Directing Fellow. I then worked in the industry for many years until I began work on what became SPELLBINDER … when everything changed.

Spellbinder? What’s that? Have you written other books?
My previous books were middle grade fantasy published by Feiwel & Friends: SPELLBINDER and THE MIDNIGHT GATE.

Do you have a website where we can keep up with your work?
I have a site, but the best place to keep up with what is going on is my blog here: www.helenstringer.net/blog. Those blogs can also be seen on my Amazon author page.

How can we follow you on Twitter and/or Facebook?
I am on FB as hcstringer and @hcstringer on Twitter. I’m not as active as I probably should be on Twitter, but I’m all over FB!

What’s next?
I have been working on a trailer for PARADIGM.
I am also in the process of preparing a web series called THE GLOAMING which shoot begin production in late January, 2014.

There also is demand for the next installment of the SPELLBINDER story, as well as a new PARADIGM book.