Me and Bobby McGee
By: Chad Coenson
Published: September 17, 2010
Format: Paperback, 268 pages
ISBN-10: 1592994881
ISBN-13: 978-1592994885
Publisher: Inkwater Press
Trained government assassin Keesey Cypher, desperate to escape his tormented past, lives in a tragic alcohol fueled world of gambling, political and corporate corruption, and ill fated romance, in the unpredictable and satiric dark comedy Me and Bobby McGee by award winning poet and novelist Chad Coenson.
Chad Coenson creates an America that is both surreal, and frighteningly all too real, where the comedic and tragic are often one and the same thing. On one level, the book is a frenetic chase through the underside of dishonest politicians, illegal corporate activity, and the dark underside of modern society. As Keesey Cypher and his mysterious and alluring partner Bobby McGee develop their own ethically and legally challenged business, they fall into a world where traffic in humanity is not only accepted but held in high esteem. On another level, the allusion to trading in peoples' lives becomes a powerful metaphor for modern American society, where a person's perceived value is measured in dollars and cents. The transference of people to just another commodity to be bought and sold, both literally as in the novel, or figuratively as in the author's dark vision of modern life, is haunting in its truth.
Chad Coenson (photo left) delves deeply into the very nature of corporate greed and corruption, and the forces that enable them. The author uses the aptly named Keesey Cypher as a symbol of the personal desires of individuals in an atomized and uncaring society. With a first name reminding the reader of author Ken Kesey and his world where the very absurdity of society is front and center, and a last name that conjures both mystery and calculating individualism, Keesey Cypher is the modern everyman. Both free and a slave to his and society's most base desires, Keesey Cypher is trapped in the author's almost prison like world. Through the liberating vehicle of speculative fiction, the author fires pointed barbs at the established values of human life, money, and the concept of freedom itself.
Chad Coenson ponders the power of the individual to create or deter tragedy on both a personal and a global level. The author recognizes the importance of freedom to choose one's fate, but also asks the more challenging question of whether a person can or should determine the fates of others. Using wry allusions to the classic Kris Kristofferson song Me and Booby McGee, Chad Coenson underlines how "Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose" through the uproarious travels of Keesey Cypher and femme fatale companion Bobby McGee.
Keesey Cypher discovers that true freedom is no longer being tied to the material possessions and the grinding apathy of society as a whole, he is able to establish his own individuality. In a world where the very subjective concept of freedom has morphed into consumer choice and exploitation of others, the only true freedom is to have nothing left to lose. Instead of being driven by that fear of material loss, or what Thoreau called "quiet desperation", Keesey Cypher achieves his own version of liberty, by making his own choices and on his own terms. Even those decisions, in the end, carry their own consequences.
I highly recommend the dark comedic novel Me and Bobby McGee by Chad Coenson, to anyone seeking a novel that is both profound and entertaining in equal portions, The author asks the most difficult questions about the nature of modern America and its people, and the portraits are not always admirable. Indeed, for Chad Coenson, the very greed and personal drive to achieve a perverted American Dream, form the basis of a loss of true freedom.
Read the fascinating and gripping novel Me and Bobby McGee by Chad Coenson, and take a roller coaster tour through the darkest side of America, where the logic and rationale for modern society themselves are put on trial. For the author, the twisted aspirations and goals of individuals, governments, and corporations fail the test.
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