The Blue Man Dreams the End of Time

By Michael McIrvin

This literary novel's absurdist tone is apparent from the beginning: "I woke up blue today. Not sad ... but actually, absolutely, from head-to-toe, blue." Thus begins Sonny's existential journey toward reconciling his former blood-soaked role in geopolitics as a CIA agent in Mesoamerica-and his equally blood-soaked destiny as predicted in Mayan mythology. Sonny's harrowing philosophical exploration is ultimately of the darkness at the heart of civilization itself, and he is not sure he wants to live long enough to discover that terrible truth.

Sonny's first task is to untangle why, more than two decades after his banishment for an act he couldn't explain, the agency would go to such lengths to mark him for death. His search embroils him in issues of tribal sovereignty, terrorism, and the drug trade as seen from the "other side."

Former operatives working for unnamed corporations blackmail Sonny into journeying to Mexico to work against tribal interests. Sonny encounters another former agent doubling as a jaguar shaman, a Mayan holy man whose prophesies include Sonny, and a ten year-old boy whose role in his people's future is as mythic and bloody as Sonny's.

In the final chapters of The Blue Man Dreams the End of Time, Sonny experiences just how gore-stained the dark machinery of history really is.

From Reviews of The Blue Man Dreams the End of Time:
McIrvin's modern noir novel includes darkly poetic and nuanced social commentary, ala Don DeLillo, and a psychological exploration of violence as central to human life, ala Cormac McCarthy, but McIrvin's vision and his language are uniquely his own. The Blue Man Dreams the End of Time offers readers a glimpse into the bleak mechanism of history, the final noir set piece a scene to make the most jaded weep for humankind. (Tim Johnson)

On his way to noir-type vengeance, Sonny offers the reader a glimpse into his past, which includes murder and torture, and thus the CIA's methods at least since Viet Nam. The reader is also asked to think about terrorism, what it is in real terms and the third-worlders who resort to it, the role of the US in the political violence in Central and South America, the role of tribal cultures in history, the drug war and drug trafficking relative to powerlessness, the hero archetype as propaganda, state power and how the young are inculcated into the culture of violence McIrvin associates not only with nations but also with corporations, the awful means by which history stumbles forward... McIrvin's novel is a hell of a read and a hell of a ride, through hell, actually. The story moves at the speed of light, but you will find yourself haunted by the world the book describes, our modern world, long after you turn the last page. (Midwest Book Reviews)

The tone is unambiguously noir, of course, and the storyline is top-shelf thriller, filled with intrigue and various plots and misdirection..., but it is moments of harsh poetry that make the book a truly memorable read. I was stopped cold several times. I had to reread passages, sometimes over and over. Not because I missed something but because the words resonate in the brain. Such excellent writing is rare in any work of fiction these days, let alone one advertised as a thriller, noir or otherwise. I highly recommend The Blue Man Dreams the End of Time. (Dan Larson)

Sonny is part tragic hero and part existential antihero and part symbolic everyman laboring under the delusions foisted upon him by his culture. His quest is into the heart of darkness that is Western Civilization itself, indeed the human condition itself as described by Michel Foucault in a bad mood. The questions this book raises are enormous, and then, the author provides frightening answers to those questions. The Blue Man Dreams the End of Time is an incredible novel. I am about to read it a third time... (Dylan Neal)

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 173419703X
• ISBN13: 9781734197037
• Release Date: January 2020
• Publisher: Fearful Symmetry Publications
• Length: 286 Pages
• Weight: 0.69 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 8.0"