Yates is a Futurist.Which is a fancy way of saying he flies around the world, lecturing various conferences, confabs, and conglomerates, dispensing prepackaged bullshit in an attempt to stay just ahead of the latest trend and claim he saw it first. But now Yates has lost faith in the very future that he’s paid to sell and gives what should be a career-ending rant. Instead, a mysterious governmental group hires him to travel the globe and discover why the world seems to hate America. From Middle Eastern war zones to Polynesian superluxe corporate retreats, James Othmer takes us on a mordantly hilarious journey through corporate double-speak and global unrest to find the truth beneath the buzz.

The Futurist

Humor & Entertainment

Othmer, James P.

Humor

Anchor

Henry Tuhoe is the quintessential twenty-first-century man. He has a vague, well-compensated job working for a multinational conglomerate. He has a beautiful wife and an idyllic home in the suburbs. But things change when Henry’s boss offers him a choice: go to the tiny, about-to-be-globalized Kingdom of Galado to oversee the launch of a new customer-service call center for a bottled water company, or lose the job with no severance, Henry takes the transfer. Once in Galado, a land both spiritual and corrupt, Henry wrestles with first-world moral conundrums, the attention of a megalomaniacal monarch, and a woman intent on redeeming both his soul and her country.

Holy Water

Literature & Fiction

United States

WHO IS THE FUTURIST? He once fired a man on Take Your Daughter to Work Day. He once was asked by the New York Times to write an Op-Ed piece on the death of literacy in America and had his assistant ghostwrite it. He once began his week ringing the bell at the New York Stock Exchange and ended it giving a speech about the future of greed to a group of seminary students. He once wrote the introduction to a book he never read, Beehive Management: How Life in the Honeycomb Translates to Winning in the Workplace. He once was an adviser for HeresWhatIDoMom.com, a company that made videos that explained people’s nebulous jobs to their confused parents. He once took batting practice with the New York Mets, pretending not to notice the eight-year-old boy with leukemia from the Make-A-Wish Foundation whom the PR director let him cut in front of because he had a plane to catch. He once gave a rousing motivational talk at the base of a spouting fountain before the West Coast sales force of an erectile dysfunction pharmaceutical maker.
Yates is a Futurist. Which is to say he makes a very good living flying around the world dispensing premonitory wisdom, aka prepackaged bullshit, to world governments, corporations, and global leadership conferences. He is an optimist by trade and a cynic by choice. He’s the kind of man who can give a lecture on successive days to a leading pesticide manufacturer and the Organic Farmers of America, and receive standing ovations at both. But just as the American Empire is beginning to fray around the edges, so too is Yates’s carefully scripted existence. On the way to the Futureworld Conference in Johannesburg, he opens a handwritten note from his girlfriend, saying she’s left him for a sixth-grade history teacher. Then he witnesses a soccer riot in which a number of South Africans are killed, to the chagrin of the South African PR people at Futureworld. Sparked by a heroic devastation of his minibar and inspired by the rookie hooker sent to his hotel room courtesy of his hosts, Yates delivers a spectacularly career-ending speech at Futureworld, which leads to a sound beating, a meeting with some quasi-governmental creeps, and a hazy mission to go around the world answering the question: Why does everyone hate us? Thus begins an absolutely original novel that is fueled by equal parts subversive satire, genuine physical fear, and heartfelt moral anguish. From the hideously ugly Greenlander nymphomaniacal artist to the gay male model spy to the British corporate magnate with a taste for South Pacific virgin sacrifice rituals, The Futurist manages to be wildly entertaining and deadly serious at the same time. It’s the novel we all deserve.

The Futurist: A Novel

DOUBLEDAY

Liar's Poker meets The Tipping Point meets Mad Men-a hilarious, personal, and sneakily profound chronicle of the past, present, and future of the advertising business. Adland is a book about advertising. Which is to say, it's a book about every issue and aspect of life on our morally conflicted, culturally challenged, ubiquitously branded planet. On one level it's the wickedly funny, compelling personal chronicle of the rise and fall of a modern-day ad man; a riveting insider's look at the astonishing transformation taking place in advertising's hottest idea factories; and an introduction to the people whose job is to know what makes us tick, what makes us lean in, what we think we need and don't know that we want. But take a step back from the tales of lavish shoots, agencies on the brink, and pampered mega-brands and Adland becomes much more: a snapshot of how we live our lives on this earth at this particular moment . . . thirty seconds at a time. Funny, profound, deeply thoughtful, and utterly unique, this book is both a wildly amusing ride in Adland, brilliantly recounted, and an exploration of the value of life in the information age.

Adland: Searching for the Meaning of Life on a Branded Planet

Business & Money

Marketing & Sales

A mordant, ruefully funny novel about downsizing, outsourcing, globalization, third-world dictatorships, and vasectomies, by the acclaimed author of The Futurist and Adland. Henry Tuhoe is the quintessential twenty-first-century man. He has a vague, well-compensated job working for a multinational conglomerate—but everyone around him is getting laid off as the company outsources everything it can to third-world countries. He has a beautiful wife—his college sweetheart—and an idyllic new home in the leafy suburbs, complete with pool. But his wife won’t let him touch her, even though she demanded he get a vasectomy; he’s seriously overleveraged on the mortgage; and no matter what chemicals he tries the pool remains a corpselike shade of ghastly green. Then Henry’s boss offers him a choice: go to the tiny, magical, about-to-be-globalized Kingdom of Galado to oversee the launch of a new customer-service call center for a boutique bottled water company the conglomerate has just acquired, or lose the job with no severance. Henry takes the transfer, more out of fecklessness than a sense of adventure. In Galado, a land both spiritual and corrupt, Henry wrestles with first-world moral conundrums, the life he left behind, the attention of a steroid-abusing, megalomaniacal monarch, and a woman intent on redeeming both his soul and her country. The result is a riveting piece of fiction of and for our times, blackly satirical, moving, and profound.

Holy Water: A Novel

Yates is a Futurist. Which is to say, he makes a very good living flying around the world dispensing premonitory wisdom, a.k.a. pre-packaged B.S., to world governments, corporations, and global leadership conferences. He is an optimist by trade and a cynic by choice. He’s the kind of man who can give a lecture on successive days to a leading pesticide manufacturer and the Organic Farmers of America, and receive standing ovations at both. But just as the American Empire is beginning to fray around the edges, so too is Yates’ carefully scripted existence. On the way to the Futureworld Conference in Johannesburg he opens a handwritten note from his girlfriend, informing him she’s left him for a fifth-grade history teacher. Then he witnesses a soccer riot in which five South Africans are killed, to the chagrin of the South African P.R. people at Futureworld. Fueled by a heroic devastation of his minibar and inspired by the rookie hooker sent to his hotel room by his hosts, Yates composes a spectacularly career-ending speech at Futureworld, the delivery of which leads to a sound beating, a meeting with some quasi-governmental creeps, and a hazy mission to go around the world answering the question Why does everyone hate us? Thus begins an absolutely original novel that is driven by equal parts corrosively funny satire, genuine physical fear, and heartfelt moral anguish. From the hideously ugly Greenlander nymphomaniacal artist to the gay male-model spy to the British corporate magnate with a taste for South Pacific virgin sacrifice rituals, The Futurist manages to be wildly entertaining and deadly serious at the same time. Wry, picaresque, and a wicked barb aimed at all that is fatuous, The Futurist is the story of a pundit who finds his audience when he proclaims he knows nothing.

World Literature

Doubleday, Canada

Yates is a Futurist. Which is to say, he makes a very good living flying around the world dispensing premonitory wisdom, a.k.a. pre-packaged B.S., to world governments, corporations, and global leadership conferences. He is an optimist by trade and a cynic by choice. He’s the kind of man who can give a lecture on successive days to a leading pesticide manufacturer and the Organic Farmers of America, and receive standing ovations at both. But just as the American Empire is beginning to fray around the edges, so too is Yates’ carefully scripted existence. On the way to the Futureworld Conference in Johannesburg he opens a handwritten note from his girlfriend, informing him she’s left him for a fifth-grade history teacher. Then he witnesses a soccer riot in which five South Africans are killed, to the chagrin of the South African P.R. people at Futureworld. Fueled by a heroic devastation of his minibar and inspired by the rookie hooker sent to his hotel room by his hosts, Yates composes a spectacularly career-ending speech at Futureworld, the delivery of which leads to a sound beating, a meeting with some quasi-governmental creeps, and a hazy mission to go around the world answering the question Why does everyone hate us? Thus begins an absolutely original novel that is driven by equal parts corrosively funny satire, genuine physical fear, and heartfelt moral anguish. From the hideously ugly Greenlander nymphomaniacal artist to the gay male-model spy to the British corporate magnate with a taste for South Pacific virgin sacrifice rituals, The Futurist manages to be wildly entertaining and deadly serious at the same time. Wry, picaresque, and a wicked barb aimed at all that is fatuous, The Futurist is the story of a pundit who finds his audience when he proclaims he knows nothing. From the Hardcover edition.

Anchor Canada

James P. Othmer, advertising executive turned novelist, gives us a hilarious, personal, and sneakily profound chronicle of the past, present, and future of the advertising business. On one level it’s the wickedly funny, compelling personal chronicle of the rise and fall of a modern-day ad man; a riveting insider’s look at the astonishing transformation taking place in advertising's hottest idea factories. But take a step back from the tales of lavish shoots, agencies on the brink, and pampered mega-brands and Adland becomes much more: a snapshot of how we are living our lives thirty seconds at a time. Funny, deeply thoughtful, and utterly unique, this book is both a wildly amusing ride in Adland, brilliantly recounted, and an exploration of the value of life in the information age.

Biographies & Memoirs

Professionals & Academics

Yates is a Futurist. Which is to say he makes a very good living flying around the world dispensing premonitory wisdom, aka prepackaged bull, to world governments, corporations, and global leadership conferences. He is an optimist by trade and a cynic by choice. He's the kind of man who can give a lecture on successive days to a leading pesticide manufacturer and the Organic Farmers of America, and receive standing ovations at both.     But just as the American Empire is beginning to fray around the edges, so too is Yates's carefully scripted existence. On the way to the Futureworld Conference in Johannesburg, he opens a handwritten note from his girlfriend, saying she's left him for a sixth-grade history teacher. Then he witnesses a soccer riot in which a number of South Africans are killed, to the chagrin of the South African PR people at Futureworld. Sparked by a heroic devastation of his minibar and inspired by the rookie hooker sent to his hotel room courtesy of his hosts, Yates delivers a spectacularly career-ending speech at Futureworld, which leads to a sound beating, a meeting with some quasi-governmental creeps, and a hazy mission to go around the world answering the question: Why does everyone hate us?    Thus begins an absolutely original novel that is fueled by equal parts subversive satire, genuine physical fear, and heartfelt moral anguish. From the hideously ugly Greenlander nymphomaniacal artist to the gay male model spy to the British corporate magnate with a taste for South Pacific virgin sacrifice rituals, The Futurist manages to be wildly entertaining and deadly serious at the same time.

The Futurist: Library Editon

Humor & Satire

Tantor Media, Inc.

The Futurist: Library Edition

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Books by Othmer, James P.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Othmer, James P.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Futurist

Holy Water

The Futurist: A Novel

Adland: Searching for the Meaning of Life on a Branded Planet

Holy Water: A Novel

The Futurist

The Futurist

Adland: Searching for the Meaning of Life on a Branded Planet

The Futurist: Library Editon

The Futurist: Library Edition