We chat with author Johnny Marciano about The 66th Rebirth of Frankie Caridi, along with writing, book recommendations, and more! PLUS we have an excerpt from the audiobook to share with you at the end of the interview.
Hi, Johnny! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
I’m a writer and sometimes illustrator who’s written over thirty books for people of (literally) all ages. I grew up on a farm and am a serious animal lover.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
Working on the farm I was the youngest of three brothers so I always did the unskilled labor–weeding, picking up rocks and stick, and raking. Because I was alone (and portable media players hadn’t been invented yet) I passed the time coming up with superhero stories and ideas for comic strips and science fiction novels.
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: John Henry by Jack Ezra Keats
- The one that made you want to become an author: Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: The Metamorphoses by Ovid
Your latest release, The 66th Rebirth of Frankie Caridi, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Funny. Dark. Supernatural. Past lives.
What can readers expect?
To laugh out loud and experience what it would actually be like to have telekinetic powers and the power to remember past lives. And to have no one around you be able to see what is so obvious.
Where did the inspiration for The 66th Rebirth of Frankie Caridi come from?
Ever since reading about the ancient cult-leader Pythagoras in Ovid, I’ve wanted to write a story about people who can remember their past lives. My daughter going to a very culty-seeming Waldorf school when I began writing the book, and I combined it with my own experience as a day student in a boarding school. But the biggest inspiration was to watch my daughter go through the pandemic during middle school, and to see her emerge from a walled-off emo phase where she’d hang out with friends in graveyards and watch Heathers non-stop into a kid who wears t-shirts and cut-off shorts and likes to go outside in the summer and watch Heathers only occasionally.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
The arguments! I love when Frankie finally faces off with her super-powered, good-two-shoes brother who has been totally indoctrinated into Dr. Natas’s cult of personality.
What’s next for you?
The most important book of my life–literally. For sixteen years, I’ve been writing and researching the story of how my grandfather Lorenzo was orphaned in an earthquake and tsunami that killed 70,000 people in southern Italy. He and his little brother were pushed into an olive tree; only Lorenzo was able to hang on.
Lastly, what books have you enjoyed so far this year and are there any that you can’t wait to get your hands on?
I’m the most boring person to ask that question to because almost everything I read is for research, which right now means books that are a hundred years old and in Italian, like 1930’s Revolt in Aspromonte by Corrado Alvaro. Good luck finding it; if you can, it’s an utterly brilliant brilliant collection of short stories. That said, I’ll put everything aside the day that William Dalrymple’s The Golden Road: How Ancient India Transformed the World drops.
