Books

Description

Harington returns to "Stay More" to document the uproarious attempt of native son, Vernon Ingledew to earn the governorship of his great, if sometimes much-maligned, state. But, to his own shock, Ingledew - a handsome but less than telegenic ham magnate and self-educated polymath - is hampered by what his opponents refer to as his Thirteen Albatrosses. Among them: he is an atheist; he never attended college; he lives in sin with his first cousin, Jelena; he displays a hysterically cryptic vocabulary. Not to mention the fact that he also supports "extirpating" - that is, getting rid of - hospitals, schools, prisons, tobacco, and handguns. Nevertheless, his candidacy quickly attracts the heaviest political hitters. This battle-tested band, known as Ingledew's Seven Samurai, are challenged not only by Vernon's extensive and dazzling liabilities, but also by kidnappings, the advent of adulterous liaisons within their own camp, and the unrelenting evil-doing of detested adversary Governor Shoat Bradfield, a model of corruption who purchased his high school equivalency certificate from a later-jailed school official. Moving from the shady lanes of "Stay More" and Vernon's palatial, double-domed retreat to the smoky warrens of cosmopolitan "Little Rock", "Thirteen Albatrosses" knowingly chronicles the dizzying display of nonsense and idealism that is contemporary politics.

Advertisement