JENNIFER GOVERNMENT

Doubleday, New York, 2003, 1^st/1^st.  ISBN 0-385-50759-3.  Hard cover, 321 pages including Acknowledgments.  Very good plus; green and black boards with green foil lettering on spine; binding tight with a slight lean.  Dust jacket with price intact has some edge wear, a bit of age toning, small nick at top rear edge near spine, small edge tear at spine bottom repaired on verso.  Book interior clean and unmarked; gently read.  ‘… hilarious vision of the near future, the world is run by giant American corporations (except for a few deluded hold-outs like the French); taxes are illegal; employees take the last names of the companies they work for; the Police and the NRA are publicly traded security firms; the Government may investigate crimes only if it can bill a citizen directly.  It’s a free market paradise!  Hack Nike is a lowly Merchandising Officer who’s not very good at negotiating his salary.  So when John Nike and John Nike, executives from the promised land of Marketing, offer him a contract, he signs without reading it.  Unfortunately, Hack’s new contract involves committing murder to build up street cred for Nike’s new line of $2,500 sneakers.  Scared, Hack goes to the Police, who assume he’s asking for a subcontracting deal and lease the job to the NRA.  Soon Hack finds himself pursued by Jennifer Government, a tough-talking agent with a barcode tattoo under her eye and a rabid determination to nail John Nike (the boss of the other John Nike).  In a world where your job title means everything, the most cherished possession is a platinum credit card, and advertising jingles give way to artillery in the fight for market share, Jennifer Government is the consumer watchdog from hell.’ (from flaps)