Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse: A Novel (Paperback)

~ (Author)
Key Phrases: big duck, blue group, fermented blood, Red Stripes, The Beast, Mother Lola (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Nine years after Mortimer Tate retreated from the end of the world (he thought) to the Tennessee mountains, three men appear before his cabin. He emerges, desperate for conversation. Unfortunately, they mistake his intentions, and he is forced to shoot them. Despite this inauspicious incident, Mortimer is optimistic enough to venture down the mountain. What passes for civilization surprises him: a chain of strip joints called Joey Armageddon’s Sassy-A-Go-Go has set itself as mankind’s savior. But as with any fledgling world-saving operation, there is opposition—to wit, the terrorist-like Red Stripes, whom Mortimer is sent to defeat. His subsequent breakneck journey is full of cannibals, slave runners, bad booze, and other dangers, none more perilous than hope. Although this dark comedy makes one laugh, it isn’t a romp in a postapocalyptic playground. It’s violent and sleazy, laced with moments of quiet gravity, an intelligent satire of how American society works even after it has broken down (the label for postapocalypse Jack Daniel’s in chapter 23 is pure comic gold). Compulsively readable. --Krista Hutley

Review

"Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse is funny, mordant, crazed, riveting, sardonic -- and despite all that, it's got a plot. Bravo for Victor Gischler." -- Hugo and Nebula award-winning author Mike Resnick --This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Touchstone (July 8, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416552251
• ISBN-13: 978-1416552253
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #23,512 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More fun than juggling armed monkeys, September 9, 2008

By	Marcus Sakey "Bestselling Novelist" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

Where to begin on a novel whose title is the barest hint of the wonderful weirdness packed inside? Gischler, best known for his excellent crime capers, here breaks new ground. And I do mean new.

Mortimer Tate has spent the end of the world hiding in a mountain cabin. He hasn't seen anyone for nine years. The first three people he does see, he kills. But really, it wasn't his fault.

Thus begins an adrenaline-soaked, wryly satiric journey through the ashes of America, a world peopled by savages and cannibals and struggling barmen, by rebel armies and mad transvestites, and by the enigmatic Joey Armageddon, whose Sassy A-Go-Go Clubs are the beacon of something a little like civilization. The prose is lean and compelling, and behind all the violence and jokes there's a Vonnegut-esque blend of both love-for and desperation-at all the madness of the world -- Mortimer's and ours.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A successful transition into new territory, July 7, 2008

By	Robert M. Kirkley (Dallas, TX) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The story relates the exploits of Mortimer Tate, an insurance salesman who is coming down the mountain after nine years of isolation to see what is left of the world he left behind. In this take on what America would look like after a world wide collapse, the key civilizing force is a chain of strip clubs called Joey Armageddon's Sassy A Go-Go.
It's a great read. This may be a departure from Gischler's usual hard boiled crime stories, but he's far from out of his element. With a plot as active as the lead character, I had to make an effort to stop reading so I could do less significant things like sleep and work. Gischler's treatment of Mortimer makes him very relateable even in the bizarre setting of the post-apocalyptic US. This take on post-apocalyptic society is laced through with multiple layers of wit, satire and Gischler's brand of black humor. If violence and a bit of sexuality don't make your spine go all squidgey, pick this one up for a thoroughly entertaining read.

17 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If Hugh Hefner Goes to Hell..., July 11, 2008

By	Gary Griffiths (Los Altos Hills, CA United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Amazon Verified Purchase

It probably looks something like this.

So I'm adding Victor Gischler, a writer as whacked as he is genius, to my short list of candidates of guys you'd most like to have a beer with. Few minds - maybe Charlie Huston's casting of a "vampyre" as a hard boiled enforcer/PI, or the inimitable Duane Swierczynski in off-the-wall bizarros like "Secret Dead Men" or "Severance Package" - could conjure a string of Go Go clubs as the cradle of reborn civilization in post-apocalyptic America, and actually make it work. Well, Gischler's warped brilliance makes it so, and if you don't pick this one up, you'll be missing a slice of new American literature that buries morality and a keen insight of humanity's apex and dregs between the pages of violence, deprivity, and yes, absurdity.

So how to explain "Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse"? Not easy, but as the title implies, the world has been trashed - the mechanism is not important - but suffice to say it's Murphy's Law applied to catastrophe of Brobdingnagian scale. Mortimer Tate, who fled to the Tennessee hills to avoid divorce and, conveniently missing the chaos, comes down from the mountain nine years later to find a world worse than northeastern New Jersey. This is David Brin's "The Postman" with a sardonic edge, or perhaps a more playful version - if "playful" even applies in a world devastated by war, famine, disease - of Cormac McCarthy's magnificently morose "The Road", or a less weighty take on Stephen King's classic, "The Stand." But to try and compare Gischler's black humor to the patriotism, utter despair, and moral redemption found, respectively, in these great works misses the author's tongue-in-cheek insight of our more base human instincts: "Yeah, I realize the world's gone way beyond Hell and we're fresh out of hand baskets - but where can a guy get a drink - and maybe a woman?"

Sure, it's sexist, but it's more - a lot more - more red meat than alfalfa sprouts, and yes, it will likely offend the more gentle and politically correct crowds of Berkeley or Madison. But hey, we're not talking "The Audacity of Hope" here - this is a different brand of fiction - and it will likely not be confused with chick-lit, either. "Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse" may be paradise lost or it may be paradise found, but while Gischler may not be Milton, he sure knows how to spin a yarn that will keep the water cooler crowd in fresh content till his next installment of inspired mayhem hits the shelves. Well done, Mr. G, and nice rebound from "Shotgun Opera".