Piece Description

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).