After four days, Michael Jan Friedman’s Kickstarter campaign for his new novel, I Am The Salamander, is right on pace to meet its goal of $5,000 by November 16th–and he’s got a team of 27 backers to thank.

“I can’t tell you grateful I am to these wonderful people for meeting the challenge I laid out for them,” Mike said, “and there are many more who have helped to spread the word, for which I’m grateful as well.”

I Am The Salamander is the story of a teen-aged superhero. But it’s not just his strange powers that set him apart from the crowd. It’s the fact that he’s a cancer survivor–a creative risk that Mike has decided to undertake.

“People don’t like to talk about cancer,” he said. “They don’t like it in their fantasy books. It’s too real. But it’s among us. And hope is such a big part of the formula for surviving cancer. If I Am The Salamander can offer even one young person the strength to plug on against the odds…that’s a goal worth the risk, isn’t it?

“One of my backers has a child who survived cancer. That’s about the most beautiful thing I can think of. It inspires me to make I Am The Salamander the best book it’s in my power to write.”