hype

Perhaps you’ve heard of 10-year-old Alec Greven, the author of a series of self-help tomes like How to Talk to Dads and How to Talk to Santa. The wee guru has appeared on the Ellen DeGeneres Show, the Today show, CNN, The Tonight Show, and Good Morning America. In December 2008, Twentieth Century Fox announced that it had optioned How to Talk to Girls, Greven’s first book and the one that launched his brand. It’s easy to see why the media has glommed on to Greven: He’s adorable, nonthreatening, and he doesn’t yet have any frown lines to show up in HD. He’s bright, but he stumbles charmingly over his words. He’s not going to freak out Meredith Vieira by talking about string theory, or intimidate viewers by solving complex math equations on air. And he’s hardly the only boy wonder out there.