Everybody Shrugged - Paperback

by Christian Bentulan (Author), Walt Pilcher (Author)

Hold tight to your car, French fries, beer, cigarettes, fluoride toothpaste, sexy underwear, bacon, butter, coffee, and anything else that tastes good, feels good, or is fun to do because here comes Congress to ban it. Professor Gardy Lavager leads the government's campaign to outlaw popular products deemed harmful to your health, and the military is stripped of guns because war is hazardous too. But Major Tony Farina of the Army's clandestine MADCOM force sets out to serve his own nefarious ends by subverting Lavager's research in the name of national security while shadowy foreign interests prepare to leverage the imminent chaos. The ensuing Harmful Substance Race spells the difference between peace and global bedlam as Gardy Lavager fears for his life from enemies at home and abroad. From the Pentagon to the Oval Office to a forgotten Army base, into the halls of academia and off to a shadowy European castle, an endearing cast bumble at cross purposes so outlandish you must keep reading to see how this delightful poke-in-the eye is resolved. Jump from the absurd to the ridiculous, careening between satire and reality in this side-splitting tale of government overreach on steroids. In a deft and entertaining finesse of a classic macroeconomic conundrum, Everybody Shrugged describes the ultimate government policy-depriving us of both guns and butter.

Author Biography

Walt Pilcher's parody radio commercials for Mother Murphy's Moldy Meatballs at age 11 foreshadowed a career in marketing from which he retired as a former CEO of several consumer goods companies, including L'eggs(R), the pantyhose in the plastic eggs (yes, really) and Kayser-Roth Corporation. He holds a BA from Wesleyan University and an MBA from Stanford University, is a former Regent University board member and currently serves on the board of Global Awakening, an international evangelistic organization. Walt's writing CV includes the first issue of Galileo; The Worm Runner's Digest; the Fire & Chocolate poetry anthology of Writers' Group of the Triad; Fresh, Ancient Paths, and O Henry magazines; and the Fusion and Ours Sci-Fi and poetry anthologies from Fantastic Books. His business leadership book, The Five-fold Effect: Unlocking Power Leadership for Amazing Results in Your Organization (WestBow Press) was a First Horizon Award finalist in the 2015 Eric Hoffer Book competition.