The Last Baby Boomer: The Story of the Ultimate Ghoul Pool

by Chris Rodell

In 2076, the sprawling Baby Boom generation is down to one last survivor, 111-year-old Martin McCrae. The distinction earns McCrae a suite at a New York City museum where contestants pay a small fee to spend fifteen minutes with him as part of an ultimate ghoul pool. If they are in the room when he expires, they win a multi-million dollar jackpot. While silently praying he will die for them, contestants ask McCrae genial questions about the past, ultimately triggering recollections of rollicking times when McCrae waged war with boredom. As the ghoul pool grinds on for five years, McCrae eventually lapses into a coma and the contestants begin to resent him for his unusual longevity. While conspiracy theorists speculate that McCrae has been dead for years, his wealthy friend revives him with an offer to secure eternal life. McCrae must now decide whether to surrender to the temptation or welcome a natural death. The Last Baby Boomer is a coming-of-really-old age satire of a dying epoch that shines a light on the illuminating fact that even though we all die, only one gets to die last. But nobody wins until death does.

256 pages, Paperback

Published December 23, 2015

About the author

Chris Rodell is the author of "Evan & Elle in Heaven & Hell: A Long Distance Social Media Afterlife Love Story." His other books include, "Arnold Palmer: Homespun Stories Of The King,” the quirky book about his oddball friendship with one of the planet’s most popular and beloved men; In addition, he's written “Use All The Crayons! The Colorful Guide To Simple Human Happiness,” and “The Last Baby Boomer: The Story of the Ultimate Ghoul Pool,” a novel that was bestowed the 2017 TINARA Award for Outstanding Satire. In Rodell’s career as a freelance writer, he has wrestled alligators, raced Ferraris, gone skydiving, lain on beds of nails, and gained twenty pounds in one week eating like Elvis. He blogs at www.EightDaysToAmish.com. He has written for many of the most prestigious magazines in America and been rejected by the rest. He lives in Latrobe, Pa., with his wife Valerie, their daughters, Josie and Lucy, and a small loud dog named Snickers. He will write for anyone who’ll pay him. He is a PROSEtitute.

Reviews

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you’re familiar with Chris’ last book, or his blog, you’ll see his trademark humor in this book. In fact, Marty McCrae is the (really old) embodiment of the living-a-colorful-life/using-all-the-crayons principle. The book is set in the future, and McCrae is the very last surviving member of the baby boomer generation. Taking society’s reality television obsession to an extreme, and ghoulish pinnacle, one crafty entrepreneur comes up with the idea of making Marty’s demise a lottery. The winner is the person in the room with McCrae when he goes to his maker. Marty agrees only because it’s an opportunity for an audience. He feels he has lots of wisdom to impart. He’s lived a long, colorful life, seen the world change, and he has quite a bit to say about it.

Marty offers little nuggets like, “I used to pray for riches and get nothing. Then I prayed for wisdom and needed nothing.” Part of his world view: “He’d laugh the hardest when things got really bad. He couldn’t wait to see if they could possibly get any worse. Usually, they did not. When you hit rock bottom, there’s no where to go but up. And he’d hit bottom so many times he’d developed saddle-like callouses on his buttocks. Humiliation’s only humiliating for those who’ve never learned to laugh at themselves. He’d mastered that years ago. He reveled in his foibles, follies and foolish mistakes.” He laments at his friend’s funeral: “It was like a party designed to be no fun. . . It was the first time in his life he was in the same room with these people where the chances of laughter were absolute zero.” On money woes: “Poverty only means poor when you’re comparing yourself to the wrong people. He’d been dumpster-diving broke a number of times in his life, but that always made him recall the poor souls who lived and died among the trash dumps in the Philippines. . . . Being dead in a cemetery must have been better than living in a landfill.” And on prayer: “Too many people pray every night that God will change the world and then spend the rest of the next day ignoring all the God-given powers each has to change the world.”

Lest I give you the idea this is a serious, philosophical book, I should mention that in this future world, women are stricken by the “Boobonic Plague” which gives women with enhanced breasts enhanced intelligence, Marty spends some time on a planet called Gonto, he comes up with the revolutionary idea to save the newspaper industry by make newspapers edible so they won’t end up in landfills, and people are having scannable bar codes implanted so people with cell phones can get the down-low on them, including how sexually aroused they are. Marty’s a drinker, and a farter, and likes his women. He is intent on coming up with a new word that will be added to the Oxford dictionary and tries out new creations all the time, like “comatoes” (when a foot falls asleep), “glibberish,” (when people make pointless party conversation and really wanted to be talking to someone else), and “slimitators” (people who starve themselves to look like skinny celebrities). You get the idea. . .

The bottom-line is that Chris is running with his idea a colorful life being the key to happiness, and he’s morphed that into this new satirical novel. This new book is humorous, but also insightful.

[Laura Luzzi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fun book. It is very funny at times, I would not read this book if your in a bad mood. I did not like the ending. The author is on to something. He is scared for the future so he decided to make fun of it, like a funeral. I found this book to be a little crass but that could have been my mood. I gave this book a 4 only because I see potential in this writer.

[Nancy Brady · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK, Boomer!

This tale of Martin McCrae and his longevity as the last (aging) baby boomer has satiric stories and humor.

Marty is the last surviving member of the group known as the Baby Boomers. He has become a living legend (and hopefully for all those who visit him, a dying one) with the last five years lying in a coma.

Each person who visits him in his bed at the Lucious B. Bolten Museum of Art and Natural History get their chance to win millions if he dies naturally while they spend fifteen (14 minutes and 59.5 seconds actually) hoping and praying he will die during their time in the room with him. If so, that person will win all the money in the ghoul pool.

For the first several years, Marty expounds on whatever he wants, talking to the person standing on the X. Who will it be? Will it be Marshall Marshall PaelyIII, who wishes to finally get back a fortune that Marty and friends cost him including the numerous costs he has already paid to enter time and time again?

Chris Rodell's humor and even an homage to his tips from "Use All the Crayons! The Colorful Guide to Simple Human Happiness," come out loud and clear throughout the novel as allows Marty McCrae to speak for him. Reading Rodell's blog, EightDaysToAmish.com a reader could read his humorous take on the world, but this novel might the next best thing.

The author warns of possible typos (and there were a few of them, misspelled words, words left out or in, and the time line is wonky...all the way through). As he says, "Like most of you, he believes to err is humon."

Read it for fun; it is supposed to humorous, and try to ignore the mistakes, but if you can't, he even includes his email address for corrections in other editions. Did this reader mention: it is a coming-of-really-old age satire.

[Amanda Peterson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Since this was a local author and the premise was intriguing I thought I would be entertained. There were grammar errors as well as the fact that I felt no connection to the story. I understand it was about waiting for someone to finally kick the bucket, but there was no development, no release, also had a hard time connecting with the characters as well.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

The concept isn't bad, but I just did not find a connection to the characters.