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WORK TITLE: Kill the Next One
WORK NOTES: trans by David Frye
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 6/19/1975
WEBSITE:
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY: Argentine
http://www.mulhollandbooks.com/books/fallwinter-20162017/kill-the-next-one/ * http://www.pontas-agency.com/federico-axat/ * https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2016/12/24/kill-the-next-one-federico-axat-book-review/95526152/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born June 19, 1975, in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
ADDRESS
CAREER
WRITINGS
Also, author of novels in Spanish, including Benjamin and El pantano de las mariposas.
Film rights for Kill the Next One were acquired by Anonymous Content and Campanario Entertainment.
SIDELIGHTS
Federico Axat is an Argentine writer. A Buenos Aires native, he has released books in Spanish, including Benjamin and El pantano de las mariposas.
In 2016, Axat released Kill the Next One, translated by David Frye. The book was originally published in Spanish as La última salida. Film rights for the volume were acquired by Anonymous Content and Campanario Entertainment. As the book begins, the protagonist, Ted McKay, knows he has a brain tumor that will eventually kill him, so he plans to commit suicide. He is moments away from shooting himself in the head when someone rings his doorbell. He opens the door to find a stranger there. The stranger, whose name is Justin Lynch, tells Ted that he knows about his planned suicide. Justin suggests that Ted help him with a plan to kill two people before he offs himself. The two proposed targets are Edward Blain and a man called Wendell. It is known that Edward murdered his girlfriend, but a jury could not convict him of the crime for lack of evidence. Wendell is also contemplating suicide, but Ted’s act will allow him to die without his family knowing of his desire to stop living. After Ted completes the two killings, someone will kill him. Ted agrees to Justin’s proposition and soon gets to work on offing his targets. All seems to be going well, until Ted discovers that his wife may have been having an affair with Wendell. Later, a threatening man in a lab coat begins following Ted, who begins having hallucinations that terrify him, and he wakes up in a mental hospital in Boston. Ted is surprised to find that he knows some of the other people who are in the hospital. Among them are his therapist, Laura Hill, with whom he discussed his plans to kill himself. The therapist tells him that he is severely delusional and that his reality does not correspond to actual events most of the time. At the hospital, Ted has a series of shocking revelations. First, he discovers that Wendell may in fact still be alive. Then, he begins believing that he is Wendell. Ted wonders if his tumor was even real to begin with. Evidence is presented that suggests that Ted may have killed many more people. Meanwhile, Ted experiences horrible nightmares and visions in which he sees dead people and mythical beasts, including minotaurs. He is also certain that a scary possum is following him around the mental ward. Ted describes what he sees to Laura, who tells him that she will help him work through his delusions and find reality again.
Reviews of Kill the Next One were mixed. A Kirkus Reviews critic suggested: “As some characters launch into verbose, windy explanations of whats going on, the narrative slows, and some plot turns become more fatiguing than breathtaking. The conclusion is nevertheless satisfying and provocative.” Patty Rhule, in a review for USA Today Online, noted: “This thriller lurches from one implausible scenario to the next.” Regarding the ending, Rhule stated: “It remains a puzzlement.” Writing for BookPage Online, Barbara Clark remarked: “Fans of more straightforward crime and suspense may lose interest, while those who like juggling multiple layers in a possible alternate reality full of changing patterns and fragments will want to stay on to the finish.” Christine Tran, a contributor to Booklist, noted that the volume features an “extremely unreliable narrator,” which creates uncertainty. Tran continued: “Axat harnesses that uncertainty to build suspense and creates an intriguing, mind-bending thriller.” A Publishers Weekly reviewer described the book as “an elegantly crafted and emotionally resonant mystery that astonishes, devastates, and satisfies in equal measure.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, October 15, 2016, Christine Tran, review of Kill the Next One, p. 20.
Kirkus Reviews, October 1, 2016, review of Kill the Next One.
Publishers Weekly, October 3, 2016, review of Kill the Next One, p. 101.
ONLINE
BookPage Online, https://bookpage.com/ (December 13, 2016), Barbara Clark, review of Kill the Next One.
Deadline, http://deadline.com/ (December 20, 2016), Mike Fleming, Jr., article about Kill the Next One.
Pontas Agency Web site, http://www.pontas-agency.com/ (July 18, 2017), author profile.
USA Today Online, https://www.usatoday.com/ (December 24, 2016), Patty Rhule, review of Kill the Next One.*
Spanish Novel Sensation ‘Kill The Next One’ Lands With Anonymous Content & Campanario
by Mike Fleming Jr
December 20, 2016 10:00am
0
Film
Books
Breaking News
News
Screenplays
Anonymous Content
Craig Rosenberg
Hachette Book Group
EXCLUSIVE: Anonymous Content and Campanario Entertainment have teamed to acquire rights to the Federico Axat novel Kill The Next One, and they have set Craig Rosenberg to write the script. First published to acclaim in Spanish as La Ultima Salida, the book now is rolling out around the world in 30 languages, mostly under the title The Last Way Out. It was just published in the U.S. by the Hachette imprint Mulholland Books. Anna Soler-Pont at the Pontas Agency made the movie deal.
Related
FX Networks Exec Nicole Clemens Joins Anonymous As Manager & Producer
Federico Axat
Federico Axat
Pontas Agency
Anonymous Content’s Michael Sugar and Ashley Zalta are producing with Jaime Dávila and Sergio Aguero from Campanario Entertainment. Jeff Okin will be an executive producer on the project.
The thriller’s protagonist, Ted McKay, is about to put a bullet in his brain when his doorbell rings and a stranger makes him an offer worth a temporary stay of self-execution: a last heroic act that would protect his family from the pain of his suicide. McKay soon finds himself at the center of a grisly game of manipulation and death.
Rosenberg’s credits include Preacher, Panopticon and The Uninvited. The novel is the third from the Buenos Aires-born Axat.
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Federico Axat
Federico Axat was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1975. Kill The Next One is a publishing phenomenon with more than 35 international publishers and has been optioned by a major Anonymous Content and Campanario Entertainment, producers of The Revenant and True Detective. Craig Rosenberg (Preacher) is writing the script.
Federico Axat was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1975. His first novel, Benjamin, was published in Spain by Suma de Letras and translated into Italian. His second novel, El Pantano de las Mariposas, was published in 2013 and translated into Portuguese, French, and Chinese. Kill The Next One is his U.S. debut.
QUOTED: "As some characters launch into verbose, windy explanations of whats going on, the narrative slows, and some plot turns become more fatiguing than breathtaking. The conclusion is nevertheless satisfying and provocative."
Federico Axat, David Frye: KILL THE NEXT ONE
(Oct. 1, 2016):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Federico Axat, David Frye KILL THE NEXT ONE Mulholland Books/Little, Brown (Adult Fiction) 26.00 ISBN: 978-0-316-35421-9
Carrying out a canny plan to kill two victims plunges a man into a world in which events and characters, including his own, change like visions in a haunted kaleidoscope.Whatever may be said for or against Argentinian author Axats American debut, most will agree that his thrillers opening sentence is a grabber that will keep readers following along, at least for a while: Ted McKay was about to put a bullet through his brain when the doorbell rang. Delaying his big finish, McKay greets one Justin Lynch. A total stranger to McKay, Lynch claims he knows what McKay was about to do with the 9 mm gun in his study. Lynch convinces McKay to delay shooting himself in order to kill two men in circumstances that justify homicide. The first proposed victim is Edward Blaine, a contemptible man who killed his girlfriend but went free from lack of evidence: McKay will be righting a sure wrong. And like McKay, the second victim, a man named Wendell, is contemplating taking his own life. If McKay shoots him, hell spare the victims family the trauma of a beloveds suicide. Believing he suffers an inoperable tumor and therefore has little to lose, McKay takes the assignments, which play out in tightly written, suspenseful scenes. Alas, there are loose ends to the plans. First, evidence confronts McKay that suggests his wife and Wendell were having an affair. Then McKay is abducted to what appears to be a Boston mental hospital. Here he meets people he knows, including a therapist he had consulted to deal with his imminent demise. Pirandello-an twists and turns follow. McKay, in the reality of the hospital, learns he may not have really killed Wendell. McKay may actually be Wendell. And McKay may not really have a tumor. A demented possum, meanwhile, stalks McKay. As some characters launch into verbose, windy explanations of whats going on, the narrative slows, and some plot turns become more fatiguing than breathtaking. The conclusion is nevertheless satisfying and provocative. Fans of alternative reality tales will probably stay the course; other readers may not.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Federico Axat, David Frye: KILL THE NEXT ONE." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Oct. 2016. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA465181874&it=r&asid=dd750e0bb9becc44dd4cbf5e9b42cbb4. Accessed 21 June 2017.
QUOTED: "extremely unreliable narrator"
"Axat harnesses that uncertainty to build suspense and creates an intriguing, mind-bending thriller."
Gale Document Number: GALE|A465181874
Kill the Next One
Christine Tran
113.4 (Oct. 15, 2016): p20.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
Kill the Next One. By Federico Axat. Tr. by David Frye. Dec. 2016.416p. Little, Brown, $26 (9780316354219); paper, $13.99 (9780316354196).
Ted McKay is seconds away from committing suicide when he's interrupted by a mysterious visitor who somehow knows about his terminal brain tumor and his suicidal intent. The visitor proposes that, rather than ending it all, Ted should join an organization designed to help rid society of monstrous criminals left unpunished. After killing his targets, Ted will become a new recruit's target. Ted agrees, but the beautifully simple plan turns catastrophic after his first set of killings. After escaping a stalker wearing a lab coat, and then after experiencing horrifying hallucinations, Ted finds himself locked in a ward for the criminally insane. While Ted struggles to determine if he's a psychopathic killer or the victim of a mind-bending conspiracy, his therapist insists that his reality consists of repeating delusions that his mind is using to hide devastating memories. The extremely unreliable narrator is sometimes a challenge to follow through the story's complicated psychological loops, but Axat harnesses that uncertainty to build suspense and creates an intriguing, mind-bending thriller in the vein of Dennis Lehane's Shutter Island (2003).--Christine Tran
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Tran, Christine. "Kill the Next One." Booklist, 15 Oct. 2016, p. 20+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA468771251&it=r&asid=2d8cb8758ba26a6369069d2cc4bad7ed. Accessed 21 June 2017.
QUOTED: "an elegantly crafted and emotionally resonant mystery that astonishes, devastates, and satisfies in equal measure."
Gale Document Number: GALE|A468771251
Kill the Next One
263.40 (Oct. 3, 2016): p101.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
* Kill the Next One
Federico Axat, trans. from the Spanish by David Frye. Mulholland, $26 (416p) ISBN 978-0316-35421-9
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Argentinian-born author Axat fuses weird fiction with psychological suspense in his stunning U.S. debut, set in the Boston area. Terminally ill businessman Ted McKay is about to shoot himself when a stranger named Justin Lynch shows up at his house with a proposal: kill a criminal who escaped justice and an innocent man who wants to die, and in return, someone will kill him, sparing his family the shame of his suicide. Ted carries out his end of the deal, only to learn that Lynch lied about the circumstances surrounding both victims. As Ted searches for the truth, strange dreams and inexplicable events cause him to question his sanity, leaving Ted and the reader uncertain as to what is real and whom to trust. Nightmare imagery, mind-bending plot twists, and a kaleidoscopic storytelling style lend Axat's tale a vertiginous air, but at the core of this literary fever dream lies an elegantly crafted and emotionally resonant mystery that astonishes, devastates, and satisfies in equal measure. (Dec.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Kill the Next One." Publishers Weekly, 3 Oct. 2016, p. 101. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA466166582&it=r&asid=7fc27505e46028818b8ceccbcbf6edfd. Accessed 21 June 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A466166582
QUOTED: "Fans of more straightforward crime and suspense may lose interest, while those who like juggling multiple layers in a possible alternate reality full of changing patterns and fragments will want to stay on to the finish."
Web Exclusive – December 13, 2016
Kill the Next One
Murder chain to tantalize the mind
BookPage review by Barbara Clark
The U.S. debut of Argentinian author Federico Axat, Kill the Next One, starts off with a genuine bang—or, more accurately, an almost-bang: “Ted McKay was about to put a bullet through his brain when the doorbell rang.”
Readers venturing past the first intriguing sentence will likely experience a variety of feelings while tackling the remainder of this book, which features convoluted plotlines and blurry trips away from any grounding in reality. The mind-bending plot contrivances work effectively to heighten the interest level of this sometimes long-winded narrative.
The bullet-stopper of the first sentence turns out to be a stranger, standing on Ted’s doorstep. He unaccountably seems to know a lot about Ted’s suicide plans, and offers him a potentially more satisfactory way to achieve his own demise. He proposes a couple of—as he describes them—justifiable killings, with the final one conveniently resulting in Ted’s own death, thus sparing his family the pain of living with the knowledge of Ted’s suicide.
The book alludes to several murders, all of which initially point to Ted as the killer. The plot, with its numerous dream sequences, knocks reality a bit awry, and Ted winds up confined as a patient in a psychiatric hospital, searching through a confusion of dreams and a fragmented past to find the truth and determine just whom—if anyone—he can trust. Laura Hill, his therapist, sticks with Ted in his search for the truth.
Kill the Next One calls on hallucinatory sequences, including a sinister-seeming animal that shows itself to Ted but may or may not be real, labyrinths, Minotaurs and dead bodies that may or may not exist. In one of their many talk sessions, Ted tells Laura about his elusive memories: It’s “just bits and pieces, all jumbled together,” he says.
And possibly that’s true in readers’ minds as well. The book is constructed much like Ted’s brain, and that can be off-putting for some readers as they struggle to stay with the plot and maintain a level of interest in the outcome. Unnecessary graphic descriptions of animal torture are also a definite drawback in this narrative.
Fans of more straightforward crime and suspense may lose interest, while those who like juggling multiple layers in a possible alternate reality full of changing patterns and fragments will want to stay on to the finish.
QUOTED: "This thriller lurches from one implausible scenario to the next."
"It remains a puzzlement."
Suicidal man gets disturbing offer in 'Kill the Next One'
Patty Rhule , Special for USA TODAY 2 p.m. EST December 24, 2016
Read an excerptpowered by Zola
Kill the Next One
by Federico Axat
(Mulholland Books)
in Mystery
USA TODAY Rating
Federico Axat’s Kill the Next One (Mulholland, 403 pp., ** out of four stars) boasts a grabber of an opening sentence, but from that moment on, this thriller lurches from one implausible scenario to the next. The curious reader will plow through to see how the heck things will sort out, but in the end, it remains a puzzlement.
With a Browning pistol pointed at his temple when the doorbell rings, Ted McKay stops to answer the door. Diagnosed with a brain tumor, Ted is determined to commit suicide, his only hesitation being the image of his wife, Holly, and two young daughters discovering his body. And the doorbell, of course.
The man at the door seems to know Ted and his mental state, and makes an intriguing offer: Kill a man no one would miss who has escaped justice, and another man who, like Ted, is terminally ill. Then Ted becomes part of a suicide club — a pyramid scheme where someone else will kill him, to spare his family the pain of knowing he killed himself instead.