OWN LITTLE WORLDS

A pair of rogue journalists investigate an explosive terrorist attack in Massey’s political satire.

A bomb goes off in a Japanese container ship in the port of Jacksonville, Florida, killing four American port employees. The suspected bomber is Harold Dumas, a member of TRIBE, a politically influential organization with a right-wing populist agenda. The bombing comes at a particularly fraught time: In just four days, the incumbent Democratic president, Oscar-winning actress Cassandra Holland, will square off against the Republican challenger, a professional wrestler and would-be despot named Daniel “the Hammer” Hammerschmidt. A former newspaper editor turned swiftly deteriorating widower named Trammell stumbles upon a possible cover-up via his neighbor, a TRIBE member who was instructed to disavow any knowledge of Dumas shortly before the bomb went off. A story like this is just the thing to bring Trammell—whose days are primarily spent standing naked on his back patio and talking to his cat—out of retirement. Working at his side is Lucy Neale, a recently laid-off investigative reporter with something to prove. Can the two of them uncover the truth behind this false-flag operation, which has the potential to upend not only the presidential race but America’s future? Told in brief, dense chapters, the narrative evokes the heightened postmodernism of Pynchon and Vonnegut. Massey has fun with the way truth and meaning have become squishy in modern life, as here when he parodies a right-wing talking head: “We have learned to disregard the deranged narrative pushed by enviro-fascists, delusional Democrats, abortion aficionados, gender-bender offenders, supercilious celebrity hypocrites, and fact-flexing liar-for-hire propagandists.” The targets of his satire are perhaps a bit obvious at this point—robotic call menus, car dealership commercials, digital media—and some of the humor is slightly stale. (There is a “covfefe” joke.) Even if Massey’s book lacks originality, his talent for language makes the reading experience worthwhile.

A sharp and cynical novel about how the death of old media has led to nightmarish politics.