LAMBERTVILLE – A new novel by “The New Jersey Historian-in-Exile” details what life would be like in an apocalyptic Garden State. It seems fitting that the state is almost there right now, locked down in a coronavirus quarantine.
“At the moment, despite struggling at home with two young kids, I used this short spring break to test out how my new novel would do on Amazon Kindle eBooks. It’s taken me seven years,” the author said today.
The Fall of New Jersey
is available for Kindle. Click here to buy it.
Philadelphians and New Yorkers often joke that they would like to blow up all the bridges leading to New Jersey. In the 77,000 word novel, The Fall of New Jersey, their wishes come true. The Fall of New Jersey is a lighthearted blend of speculative fiction and comedy taking place in an apocalyptic Garden State, in the style of Voltaire’s Candide, “The Warriors,” and “Shaun of the Dead.”
Aliza Centanni, a Resident Assistant, was to be sworn in as the youngest elected mayor in state history, but now has zero constituents to advise. She encounters Madame Cheree, an Atlantic City fortune teller, John Overhill, a surfing superintendent with a talent for confectionery, and Renfrew, a troubled teenager obsessed with sex and explosives. On behalf of the South Jersey Shore Membership Library, the four set out on a quest to save New Jersey from a horde of tangerine undead, somewhat derailed by the fact that none of them know how to pump their own gas.
Readers will meet The Jersey Devil, along with a certain missing Russian. There’s a talking groundhog from Pennsylvania, roller girls, Princeton Tiger Mothers and a porcine river-kraken, nicknamed, “Taylor Sam.” Yes, residents still aruge over his real name.
photo by Vlad Calin @vladootz_art