Welcome to Ray’s ‘reality’

Ray Glickman, chief executive of a West Australian aged and community care provider, is living proof that dreams can in fact become ‘reality’. While juggling his role at care provider, Amana Living, along with his newly held title of published author, hasn’t come easy, it has been worthwhile.

Posted February 26th 2014

by super

Providers

<p>Amana Living's chief executive, Ray Glickman, has published his first book.</p> — Amana Living's chief executive, Ray Glickman, has published his first book.

Mr Glickman’s first novel titled Reality was published earlier this month.

The novel Reality took five years to write, a year and a half to critique and re-write and then another six months to find a publisher.

The narrator in the novel is inspired by exposure to reality TV to undertake his own superior form of manipulation of unsuspecting people.

With Mr Glickman’s own background in psychology and philosophy, he remains fascinated by how people create for themselves their own individual realties.

Fundamentally, the story is about personal responsibility. A senior bureaucrat finds himself bored with his easy success and looks for the next big challenge. He finds his inspiration from the unlikely source of reality TV.

He insinuates himself into the lives of six unsuspecting people. The core question is, according to Mr Glickman, ‘Who is responsible for their actions in these circumstances?’

“The characters are essentially archetypes of the people I know and have worked with. I’ve taken bits and pieces of a lot of my friends and colleagues and put them into the characters and have borrowed lots of real life events, behaviours, phrases and sayings to bring these characters to life,” Mr Glickman explains.

“Reality TV, social media and the like provide people with opportunities to explore alternative personas and live out different realities. These media have also accentuated the desire people have always had for their ‘15 minutes of fame’.

“It’s interesting to observe what people are prepared to give up, including their individuality and privacy, for ‘fame’.”