App, Secret Sites Create The Immersive World Of 'Night Film'
When you watch a DVD these days, there's a whole array of extras waiting for you after the movie — commentaries, deleted scenes, special re-creations that add to the experience.
But what if you are a novelist and want to do the same? Could you? Should you?
In her new thriller, author Marisha Pessl mixes traditional literature with elements from the digital world. The book is called Night Film, and it's the fast-moving tale of a relentless journalist trying to unravel the mysterious death of a famous filmmaker's daughter.
But the story doesn't end there.
In the very back of the book, just before the acknowledgements, you'll find instructions to continue the story — with an app. Pessl tells NPR's Audie Cornish that the idea for the app originally came from her need to find a quick way to set up the world of reclusive filmmaker Stanislas Cordova for her readers. "I wanted to have cultural cornerstones that immediately alerted readers to the fact that he was endemic within popular culture as this reclusive cult figure," she says.