The zucchini conspiracy
Subtitle: a novel of alternative facts
By: Timothy Balding
Publisher: Upper West Side Philosophers, Inc.
Published: 2019
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 204
ISBN-13: 9781935830672; 9781935830689
Description: "The United States of America and Bangistan, a forgotten, former Soviet satellite dictatorship crushed between the borders of Russia and China, are engaged in a war of words. This verbal conflict begins when the brother of Great Leader Hakim Akim learns about Twitter from a sado-masochistic call girl in a Zurich bordello. As Yogi sets up an account for Hakim - @bestdespot - he stumbles across President Ronald Rump's threat: "Bangistan! Bangistan! You're Dead!", which is subsequently, but too late, discovered to have been a predictive text error. Akim's insults about Rump's fake golf handicap, his need to pay women for sex ("Come to Bangistan, it's free!") and his pitiful wealth, eventually provoke the American President's ire and wrath and threat to wipe the 'sixth Stan' off the world map. The crisis of words turns to a real risk of armed conflict when the White House discovers that Bangistan has a stockpile of nuclear warheads and intercontinental missiles left behind by Russia and that it will knock out Florida Disneyland and Coney Island as a foretaste of its resolve. Rump agrees to go and meet Akim, something that scares absolutely everybody even more than the threats of war. Meanwhile, a British diplomat on holiday in the French Basque country stumbles across a Gascon peasant woman, a zucchini farmer, who bears a most astonishing physical resemblance to Rump. In a subsequent revelation at the sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes, he realizes that it is his duty to prevent Rump and Akim ever meeting - Marie-Pierre Etxeberria must go in his place. A plot is born, engaging the heads of the foreign security services of the G7 nations, whose annual summit will soon be held in Versailles, at the Chateau. It will be called 'Operation Kagemusha' - the 'decoy' in Japanese. There, the other six heads of State abduct Rump during a walk in the woods. He is held captive in a hunting lodge, while Madam Etxeberria is taken to Petrobangorski - the Bangistan capital - by the CIA to meet Akim. She thinks she is signing a zucchini export contract with Hakim; he imagines he's making the best deal of his life to destroy his arms stocks in exchange for a vast fortune in gold. In fact, the arms no longer exist, because his brother has sold them all off to Iran, notably. The Americans do not know this. Rump is forced to pretend that he did go to Bagistan, did negotiate an end to the conflict. He cannot, after all, admit that he was tied to his bed in a hut in the Versailles woods while a French peasant brings peace to the world. The CIA also forces him to step down as a candidate for a second term. We last see him in a Florida rest home for the demented rich, regaling the other inmates with stories of his "great deal" with Akim and his reward of the Nobel Peace Prize. This is a lie. The Prize that year is awarded to a 19-year-old gorilla, Malabo, from Madrid Zoo"--