One Percent Solution

Were it not for the fickle finger of fate flicking everyone a birdie, none of the harsh actions now being considered would ever have even been contemplated, and the hapless people on that distant world would have been free to live their lives at their leisure.

But that’s not what happened! Because when the graduate-student astronomer, Sofia Song, catapults from her world to the Blue Planet, a dog-eat-dog world where one-tenth of 1% of the people, “The Ones,” own all of the planet’s riches, and the rest are left scrounging for scraps—a world where oligarchs have hijacked democracy and steered it to their own private purpose—her calamitous journey through space and time ignites a string of events leading to the cataclysmic destruction of both worlds.

Ahriman, the most powerful of The Ones wants her dead. His son Francis tries to help her but can’t. The brutal Captain seeks revenge. The corrupt Reverend wants her condemned. Irina fights to keep from starving. Dmitri the smuggler is fleeing. And a soldier from Gâia follows one day behind her, intent on destroying the world.

Through this maelstrom Sofia wanders, with only 30 hours to rescue her friend, and less than five days to save her world. Sadly she fails, but not before altering the timelines of history and lighting hope for those who will follow.

Reminiscent of Vonnegut, with a dash of Saramago and Fforde, this humorous, often irreverent romp mocks the absurd we accept to be normal, ridicules the low bar we set, and challenges us to demand more of ourselves by making light of what is sacred that shackles us.