2034: Evangelical secret agents, fast food moguls, the voice of God in computer software, violence in the Bermuda Triangle! George W. Bush’s foreign policy vindicated by a quick victory in Iraq, lucrative invasions of Egypt and Syria followed, bringing unparalleled prosperity to America and setting off thirty years of right-wing rule. But when a war in Iran goes bad–and the resulting cover-up goes worse–the Democrats reclaim the presidency. This is the time of Pax Americana and its zealous anti-hero, government agent Tuck Squires. Reading the ironic silences between the lines of the thriller, and roaring like a jet engine, Pax Americana is a sacrilegious, conspiratorial monster; like a literary dogfight between Ian Fleming and Robert Anton Wilson, loaded with prophecy, Baumeister’s debut is an exorcism and an antidote for our era.
Pax Americana is Baumeister’s acclaimed first novel with Stalking Horse Press. His second, Twilight of the Gods publishes in 2024.
Pax Americana is available from your favorite bookstore, direct from our online store, or from Bookshop, Amazon, etc.
“Kurt Baumeister has more fun with language than any novelist since Money-era Martin Amis. I haven’t read such marvelously obsessive prose in years.” —Darin Strauss, author of The Real McCoy and Half a Life
“Ambitious, fearless, and frequently brilliant, Pax Americana is a speedball of religion and politics delivered in a steel syringe of adrenalin. In the mad, mad world of a not-implausible future, Baumeister posits the larger question of which deity we’re destined to worship: The God of the bible or the god of technology?” —Chuck Greaves, author of Hush Money and Tom and Lucky (and George & Cokey & Flo)
“Filled with lush imagery, lyricism, and absurdity, Pax Americana brings into relief the subtext of political power. Kurt Baumeister has an eerily prescient grasp of entitlement in this century and is fearless about imagining the consequences when pushed to its logical conclusion. A daringly imaginative book.” —Thaisa Frank, author of Heidegger’s Glasses and Enchantment
“Slangy, irreverent, and terribly comic, Baumeister’s Pax Americana is a satirical ode to America Past, Present, and Future. A cruise missile aimed straight at the heart of religious extremism, this is a book you need to read. Before it’s too late.” —Ted Heller, author of Slab Rat, Funnymen, and Pocket Kings
