God Bless Us, Every One!
A Farcical Fantasy Novel
by
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Peter gave up trying to understand the limericks written on the jail-cell wall. He had no idea where Nantucket was, so a good many of them made no sense at all. Another provided no explanation as to why the bloke from Effingham had to be stopped, and another indicated the author’s sense of male anatomy lacked all grounding in possibility.
Bored and frustrated, he ambled to Matthew’s side and asked, “So how is it I’m a spy when I didn’t know I am?”
“You’re not,” said Matthew, without taking his eyes off the stone wall beyond the bars of their cell.
“That rather rude policeman said I am.”
“It’s a mistake.”
“Oh,” said Peter, rocking back and forth from heels to toes. “Too bad, really. I rather like the idea now that I’m used to it.”
“They shoot spies, you know. When they catch them.”
“Do they? Don’t care much for that,” said Peter, with a wince. “Better not get caught then, should I?”
“I wouldn’t if I were you.”
“No wonder Countess Oleander told me to keep quiet about our … you know.”
“Very wise.”
“Still. I’m surprised she didn’t tell me I was a spy then. All this time, I’ve been thinking I was keeping … you know … doing it secret, when all along, it was being a spy I was supposed to keep quiet about. Don’t you think that’s rather odd?”
“Not really,” said Matthew, glancing sidelong to meet his brother’s gaze. “Doing it her way worked well enough, didn’t it?”
“Yes, I suppose it did when I think about it. I mean: How can you tell people about something when you don’t know anything at all about it?”
“You can’t.”
“Exactly. And I didn’t have a clue, did I?”
“Not an inkling.”
“Probably why it took so long for the Old Bill to catch on,” said Peter, imagining his long evasion of capture was proof of man-of-ill-repute accomplishment.
“No doubt.”
“I’ll say!” said Peter happily, but his expression changed to doubt. “Oh. And speaking of getting caught, why is it you didn’t tell me it’s against the law to buy cameras?”
“I didn’t think you were serious.”
“Oh, right. I suppose I wasn’t, really. I just wanted an excuse to chat up Mary Handchester and invite her round to my place.”
“How did that go?”
“Quite well, actually. She said she’d come and let me take pictures of her with my new camera. Then she said some things in French, so I sort of lost the thread.”
“Mary speaks French?”
“Surprised me too, I’ll say!” said Peter emphatically. “On and on she goes about ‘lingerie’ and ‘au naturel’ and ‘boudoir.’ As if I’m supposed to have the foggiest what she’s on about.”
As diverting as the conversation was, Matthew couldn’t keep his mind from drifting back to a near future filled with excruciating interrogations, truncated trials, and firing squads.
“You mention any of this to the police?” he asked with some concern.
“All of it. They didn’t half look at me odd!”
Matthew cringed and then decided there’s little point in keeping up appearances amid the chaos of catastrophe. “Never mind,” he said. “I’m sure it’ll all come clear soon enough.”
“I hope so. Not knowing what’s next is the worst part.”
“Really?” said Matthew, with envy of Peter’s distance from reality. “I’d rather hoped ignorance is bliss.”
“Well, I suppose it could be. If you’re prone to that kind of thing, I mean.”
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About the Book
Caution: Literature purists may be offended.
God Bless Us, Every One! cannot be called a sequel to Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol because it’s different from the classic in too many ways. Yet it does use it as backstory. The opening scene mirrors the first paragraphs of A Christmas Carol by reporting the death of Scrooge in a similar fashion to Dickens’s announcement of the death of Marley. Coombs extends the wordplay, furthering the jokes Dickens makes to set the tone for the book. And he borrows other tropes and style features from Dickens for comic effect—surreal grotesque characters with suggestive names populate this novel rife with puns and malapropisms of all types.
The style of God Bless Us, Every One! might be described as faux-Dickensian, but the work draws inspiration from a long line of humorists right up to today’s edgiest writers. It’s a trenchant satire that mocks cultural norms, genre fiction, predatory capitalism, ethnic stereotyping, and religion all through the vehicle of a ludicrous storyline of dark comic fantasy.
Tiny Tim is the atypical hero of the story. Reduced to a vegetative state, he becomes an empath with the magical ability of picking up emotions from others, then radiating them out into the world. Without a will of his own, he becomes a tool of unscrupulous people who use him to manipulate markets and political sentiment—often to disastrous ends.
About the Author
Photograph courtesy of
Encyclopedia Galactica: Alternate Reality Division.
David Roy Coombs writes across the spectrum of speculative fiction from surrealism to magic realism to historic fantasy, alternating between works of farcical comedy and psychological drama. Drawing from his polymath set of interests and checkered career experiences, David crafts stories of fantastical imagination about unique characters faced with odd and curious challenges.