A Perfect Life Jimmy Clark is the poster child for the World Government's promise to provide everyone with a perfect life. In this satire of a dystopian future the 300 highest-earning global corporations control the World Government. Data on everyone, collected by AlwaysWatch, is sent to Interpol. To be outside the view of AlwaysWatch's cameras is against World Government law. Jimmy's early life is managed by Radiant Technologies and Biostream- mega-global-corporations that analyze Big Data to engineer the perfect life. Removed from his parents at birth, Jimmy is assigned to a robot guardian Sally, who becomes his lifetime companion sometimes sharing his bed. Shaped by the "right" schools for the perfect job in his perfect life, Jimmy is pushed into the Zeus Fund. There, at the altar of the Temple of Mammon, he unwittingly completes the Internet of Things, linking all data with global corporations and government agencies. As this dark, ironic spoof unfolds, Jimmy's perfect life cracks apart. Truths begin to surface. The love of his life-a privileged, spoiled, anti-World Government activist- is killed. Stimulating consumerism with drugs, fantasies and enticing scents, the World Government's Office of Shoppiness causes mass riots and shopping mall burnings. Seizing this opportunity for a windfall, SleepWell, DieWell and GoCancer flood the devices of the dying with ads suggesting "Isn't it time to rest and sleep?"
Author Biography:
Joel Spring lived for many years on an island off the coast of Sitka, Alaska. His novel, Alaskan Visions, reflects these Alaskan experiences. His recent novels include An All-American Family, which is about Native Americans, slavery, racism, gay marriage, and hippies, and Common Core: A Story of School Terrorism, a satire about recent school reform. His current novel is A Perfect Life. He is an enrolled member of the Choctaw Nation. His great-great-grandfather was the first Principal Chief of the Choctaw Nation in Indian Territory and his grandfather, Joel S. Spring, was a district chief at the time Indian Territory became Oklahoma. He is a citizen of the Choctaw Nation I.D. #1274408293. Spring has given invited lecture nationally and internationally, including Singapore, Turkey, China, Vietnam, New Zealand, Australia, and Taiwan. In the fall of 2012, he lectured on "Global Issues: Schooling Minority Cultures and Languages" to honor the opening of the multicultural center at Minzu University, Beijing China. He has been given numerous educational awards and lectureships including the Society of Professors of Education Mary Anne Raywid Award for Distinguished Scholarship in the Field of Education; the University of Wisconsin Alumni Achievement Award; Gerald H. Read Distinguished Lecturer; Presidential Lectureship, University of Vermont; Mitstifer Lectureship; Green Honors Chair Lectures, Texas Christian University; R. Freeman Butts Lecture; and the John Dewey Memorial Lecture. He has published over twenty books on American and global school policies. His most recent scholarly works include The Economization of Education; Globalization of Education: An Introduction 2nd Edition; Political Agendas for Education: From Race to the Top to Saving the Planet; Corporatism, Social Control, and Cultural Domination in Education: From the Radical Right to Globalization; with Anthony Picciano, The Great American Education-Industrial Complex: Ideology, Technology, and Profit; and Education Networks: Power, Wealth, Cyberspace, and the Digital Mind. His textbook American Education is currently in its 17th edition.
