Overton Window: Prologue
Aug. 18th, 2010 09:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabbyThe Overton Window is, ostensibly, a political thriller. I don’t read or watch enough of those to decisively say that the genre leans to the right, but I suspect that it does in the way that pulp SF leans libertarian and magical realism leans left. (Can you name a right-wing magical realist novel? I can’t.) That’s not to say that left-wing political thrillers don’t exist—I just finished Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, which is about as politically progressive as they come, and highly entertaining to boot—but certain conventions of the genre lend themselves well to a reactionary perspective. Keep the pace fast and the stakes high, and no one notices the errors in your sloppy thinking or writing. It's just like the War on Terror!
So the beginning of the novel is pretty conventional thriller stuff. A panicky informant named Eli Churchill is on the phone with someone named Beverley. He’s in the Mojave Desert. He has big news for this Beverley person involving a missing “two-point-three trillion dollars” (Beck writes it out for some reason), eleven missing nuclear warheads, and a vast conspiracy. He knows he’s running out of time, both because there are people after him and also he’s on a pay phone. In the Mojave Desert. He has spent years amassing all sorts of evidence on this conspiracy, so of course he gives her precise and detailed information the second he gets through to her.
Just kidding. He’s apparently been rambling for quite some time before our story begins, because the first thing Beverley says is: “Get to the point.”
His point:
Now, of course, people in real life do ramble, and fear, excitement, and so on play all sorts of havoc with one’s ability to communicate, but if one has the sort of world-shattering information Eli claims to possess and one is being chased by secretive scary killer types, one tends to not be able to recall the dimensions of large amounts of money when it’s stacked in a pile. Not saying that he would be concise and clear, just that I think he’d probably be rambling about something else. Like: “Oh God oh God I’m going to DIE.”
Now, prologues are all about creating a sense of mystery, but it would be helpful here to know the tiniest bit about Eli. What sort of informant is he? The chattering conspiracy theorist sort, a whistleblower, or a professional journalist? The first two would make his incoherency excusable; the latter would not. At any rate, he gives Beverley only the vaguest of outlines: “They” have spent the missing money on creating some sort of shadow political and economic system and they intend to crash the current one. “They” own the media and the sheeple are so brainwashed that when this disaster happens, everyone will just go along with their wicked plan.
Then, a sniper shoots Eli in the head, making Eli presumably the luckiest character in the story because he gets to exit it so quickly, and saving us the agony of reading more babble.
I was curious about this $2.3 trillion thing, so I looked it up. Apparently it’s quite a popular conspiracy theory amongst Loose Changers. The theory is that Donald Rumsfeld announced that there was $2.3 trillion missing from the U.S. Treasury on September 10, 2001, and the 9/11 attacks were an attempt to cover up the fact that the Bush Administration had embezzled all that. This seems unlikely—after all, if they had taken it, why would they announce it? Anyway, two seconds of Googling yielded the exact quote that has the Loose Changers’ and Beck’s panties all in a twist:
Okay, well, that’s pretty irresponsible, but there’s a huge gulf between “our computer systems suck and need to be overhauled” and “holy crap all this money is MISSING! LOLZ! Because we stole it. *mustache twirl* MUAHAHAHAHA!” In order for a conspiracy theory to entertain me, it must begin to actually make sense and involve conspirators who have a motive and don’t announce their wicked deeds in press releases.
The prologue fails to generate any sort of suspense, as this guy is annoying and stupid enough that I’m already on Team Sniper. All it has me wondering is whether Loose Change is a left-wing or a right-wing conspiracy, and also whether there are really payphones in the middle of the Mojave Desert.
ETA:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
zingerella informs me that the Mojave Desert phone booth is a Thing. Okay, that's really cool. But since it has been removed, it is still a big pile of Fail for Beck's near-future political thriller. Anyway, there is apparently a sinister conspiracy theory about the phone booth's removal, bringing the Conspiracy Count to two in the prologue alone.
Conspiracy count: 2
So the beginning of the novel is pretty conventional thriller stuff. A panicky informant named Eli Churchill is on the phone with someone named Beverley. He’s in the Mojave Desert. He has big news for this Beverley person involving a missing “two-point-three trillion dollars” (Beck writes it out for some reason), eleven missing nuclear warheads, and a vast conspiracy. He knows he’s running out of time, both because there are people after him and also he’s on a pay phone. In the Mojave Desert. He has spent years amassing all sorts of evidence on this conspiracy, so of course he gives her precise and detailed information the second he gets through to her.
Just kidding. He’s apparently been rambling for quite some time before our story begins, because the first thing Beverley says is: “Get to the point.”
His point:
“Yes, good, okay. Two-point-three trillion dollars is what we’re talking about. Do you know how much that is? From sea level that’s a stack of thousand-dollar bills that would reach to outer space and back with thirty miles to spare.”
Now, of course, people in real life do ramble, and fear, excitement, and so on play all sorts of havoc with one’s ability to communicate, but if one has the sort of world-shattering information Eli claims to possess and one is being chased by secretive scary killer types, one tends to not be able to recall the dimensions of large amounts of money when it’s stacked in a pile. Not saying that he would be concise and clear, just that I think he’d probably be rambling about something else. Like: “Oh God oh God I’m going to DIE.”
Now, prologues are all about creating a sense of mystery, but it would be helpful here to know the tiniest bit about Eli. What sort of informant is he? The chattering conspiracy theorist sort, a whistleblower, or a professional journalist? The first two would make his incoherency excusable; the latter would not. At any rate, he gives Beverley only the vaguest of outlines: “They” have spent the missing money on creating some sort of shadow political and economic system and they intend to crash the current one. “They” own the media and the sheeple are so brainwashed that when this disaster happens, everyone will just go along with their wicked plan.
Then, a sniper shoots Eli in the head, making Eli presumably the luckiest character in the story because he gets to exit it so quickly, and saving us the agony of reading more babble.
I was curious about this $2.3 trillion thing, so I looked it up. Apparently it’s quite a popular conspiracy theory amongst Loose Changers. The theory is that Donald Rumsfeld announced that there was $2.3 trillion missing from the U.S. Treasury on September 10, 2001, and the 9/11 attacks were an attempt to cover up the fact that the Bush Administration had embezzled all that. This seems unlikely—after all, if they had taken it, why would they announce it? Anyway, two seconds of Googling yielded the exact quote that has the Loose Changers’ and Beck’s panties all in a twist:
The technology revolution has transformed organizations across the private sector, but not ours, not fully, not yet. We are, as they say, tangled in our anchor chain. Our financial systems are decades old. According to some estimates, we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions. We cannot share information from floor to floor in this building because it's stored on dozens of technological systems that are inaccessible or incompatible.
Okay, well, that’s pretty irresponsible, but there’s a huge gulf between “our computer systems suck and need to be overhauled” and “holy crap all this money is MISSING! LOLZ! Because we stole it. *mustache twirl* MUAHAHAHAHA!” In order for a conspiracy theory to entertain me, it must begin to actually make sense and involve conspirators who have a motive and don’t announce their wicked deeds in press releases.
The prologue fails to generate any sort of suspense, as this guy is annoying and stupid enough that I’m already on Team Sniper. All it has me wondering is whether Loose Change is a left-wing or a right-wing conspiracy, and also whether there are really payphones in the middle of the Mojave Desert.
ETA:
zingerella informs me that the Mojave Desert phone booth is a Thing. Okay, that's really cool. But since it has been removed, it is still a big pile of Fail for Beck's near-future political thriller. Anyway, there is apparently a sinister conspiracy theory about the phone booth's removal, bringing the Conspiracy Count to two in the prologue alone.Conspiracy count: 2
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no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:34 am (UTC)/barely-relevant RP journal
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:35 am (UTC)...you haven't seen it yet, have you? Because I NEED to see the look on your face when you see it for the first time.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:41 am (UTC)I love you.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:42 am (UTC)1. Pleased
2. Joyful
3. Ecstatic
4. Beaming
5. Pissing Sunshine
6. Farting Rainbows
7. Shitting Unicorns
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:50 am (UTC)*farts a discreet rainbow or two*
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Date: 2010-08-19 12:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 01:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 03:13 am (UTC)OMG! I've read this one before! The Jews did it!
This seems unlikely—after all, if they had taken it, why would they announce it?
Oops! I misplaced the two-point-three trillion dollars I embezzled!
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 03:18 am (UTC)I'm pretty sure this is heading towards the Jews did it.
Mojave Phone Booth: THE MOVIE!!!
Date: 2010-08-19 03:33 am (UTC)This is the story of four disparate people whose lives intersect with this mystical outpost. With themes of love, death, the mystery of the universe, and the phenomenon of inter-connectivity, Mojave Phone Booth pitches us deep into the lives of these working class people in Las Vegas. (from the website)
Re: Mojave Phone Booth: THE MOVIE!!!
Date: 2010-08-19 12:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 04:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 04:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 08:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:31 pm (UTC)I hate capitalism.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:18 pm (UTC)Good luck with the next part.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:48 pm (UTC)You forgot some stuff in between, I think. Four calling birds? Three French hens?
no subject
Date: 2010-08-19 12:49 pm (UTC)