When I started reading Avraham Azrieli's latest novel, The Plot to Save America, my initial feeling was, could this actually take place? However, what is indeed chilling is that I received the book while following the Jan 6th investigations and their revelations. Although the story may be over-the-top and comical at times, I still have this lingering feeling as to the consequences of Trump stealing the election.

The narrative features a Death Penalty Investigator #1645 (Death Penalty Investigator's identities are strictly confidential) who begins by telling us that what we are about to read is his report dealing with Stuart Tenison, who was sentenced to death by The Domestic Terror Tribunal on Jun 5th, 2024.

The investigator remarks that his investigation not merely contributed to the ending of his career, but also resulted in a devastating national catastrophe. For these reasons, he felt compelled to come clean and publicize his report. It should be mentioned that everyone condemned to death was entitled to a review by the Death Penalty Review Board.

Who is Tenison? He was regarded as a respected American Patriot who invented the Lime-Green Patch that immigrants had to wear at all times. Up to his arrest, he served three years as Chief Inspector at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for the Mid-Atlantic division. In addition, he had twenty-five years with law enforcement, fifteen years with Oath Keepers, eight years with MAGA, and three years with the SSS (Stop the Steal Soldiers). These so-called soldiers wear the SSS pin on their lapel-something similar to the Nazi S.S. symbol.

When the investigator first interrogates Tenison, he is in prison and is seriously ill because of radioactive poisoning. Why was he sentenced to death? Based on a photograph and a sworn affidavit by ICE agent Rob Lancaster, Tenison was caught sharing a leaf of paper with a foreign spy near the office of the European Union Delegation in Washington. However, the evidence did not reveal the entire document but a piece of paper with the ensuing heading: "The Plot to Save America By An Anonymous Eyewitness."

The investigator produces the sheet of paper, which seemingly bears brown and crusted human blood blotches. Tenison had spotted it while he was investigating an apparent suicide involving a white male who possibly shot himself in his automobile.

The deceased turns out to be  a prominent government employee and Tenison doubted that the deceased had taken his own life.

Tenison declines to cooperate with the investigator and discloses nothing involving this strange document, which we will ultimately learn had a profound consequence on the USA.

As background, readers are informed that Donald Trump successfully prevented the certification by Congress of Joe Biden for President under the U.S. Constitution. The Stop the Steal movement is alive and kicking, fueled by Trump's blatant lies. The tall distortion is that a radical group of Black Lives Matter and Antifa terrorists, pretending to be supporters of Trump, forced their way into the Capital, precipitating a fire that expanded throughout the building bringing down the dome and the loss of half of the members of the House and Senate including Vice President Mike Pence.

On the evening of this ghastly incident, Trump signed the Capital Fire Decree, instituting a state of emergency on the entire country and advocating war on Domestic Terror. The U.S. Constitution was suspended, and martial law was imposed nationwide. We are now in a country where Trump has unlimited authority. And among the many new laws and decrees enacted is the prohibition of same-sex marriages, and homosexuality is regarded as a mental illness requiring incarceration.

Once Azrieli sets up his yarn, it travels at a crisp pace, where we can get easily bogged down on the minutiae. Still, we are engaged by the whole as to how fragile is democracy and how matters could have been very different. It accomplishes the theme of alternate history with style and keen perception, providing a fascinating glimpse of "what if" a ferocious demagogue had come to power?

Azrieli undoubtedly set out to accomplish more than entertain with this political thriller. But he wrote the book to make America wake up.

In his closing chapter, he reminds us of Hitler and Nazism, where people blindly followed a mad man, causing the murder of millions.

Noteworthy is Azrieli's mention of Daniel Goldhagen's book Hitler's Willing Executioners, Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust. "It was fascinating to learn how history repeated itself, but it gave me little comfort to learn how many Germans also believed in lies that justified active participation in the mass killing of innocent people." Could this happen in the USA, and are we taking what happened on Jan 6th seriously?

Follow Here To Read Norm's Interview With Avraham Azrieli