The Real Alice Cooper Wants To Be Famous

About the Book

Brother Gilroy is a cloistered monk whose entire life has been spent at Holy Mansion Monastery, a sleepy, time-worn refuge from the modern world. His life is quiet, uneventful, and wholly dedicated to prayer and contemplation.

Until, that is, a woman by name of Alice Cooper shows up one hot summer day and runs him down on a country road. Alice (who deeply regrets not only her name but also the deadening life and boring husband she’s running from) has brought baggage with her—not just her teenage daughter, not just the unborn baby she’s carrying, and not just the legion of cops pursuing her. Alice has also brought the whole frenetic world of the new millennium into a timeless Holy Mansion Monastery.

Her arrival at the monastery is the spark that lights a series of conflicts. A half-dozen stories unfold from her insistent demand that the world finally pay attention to her. There is, first, the state trooper who believes that his life has been ruined because of her. Trooper Brad Hymen cannot accept the fact that she has flouted his authority—and so launches a deadly, years-long pursuit of her. Across the continent, her abandoned husband, Benjamin P. Cooper, is likewise undone by Alice’s Big Escape from a life of middle-class respectability. Inadvertently, and very much unwillingly, he too feels compelled to avenge himself.

Then there is Brother Gilroy himself. He soon finds that he is not at all immune to Alice Cooper. He begins to see her as the embodiment of the modern world, in all its chaos, its lusting need, and its search for love and belonging. Worse yet, he begins to see her as the attractive, alluring woman she is.

When Alice unearths a winning $294 million lottery ticket Brother Gilroy was given some time before, the die is cast for all of these people. The money becomes the instrument of all the seismic upheaval that courses through The Real Alice Cooper Wants To Be Famous. By enabling Alice to pursue her dream of a lifetime—her stand against the world—the $294 million takes on a life force that inexorably defines the novel’s course. Using the lottery proceeds, Alice creates Second Fate, a foundation that seeks out those who (like Alice herself) have been overlooked in their pursuit of fame. In short order, she achieves all that she’s ever wished for.

But her actions have far-reaching consequences.

Because of Second Fate, two more women who have been leading quiet, uneventful lives are swept up into the action. Each in turn is fated to join with Benjamin Cooper, the jettisoned husband who (like the modern age itself) is quickly becoming a fascinating study in psychosis. First Dorothy Rosenthal and then Cathy Moriarity, hoping that this broken man has the answers they are seeking, take him in. But Benjamin Cooper has no answers—only questions of his own. As he frantically, mindlessly pursues the wife who has so cavalierly left him behind, more and more people who cross his path pay a price for their dreams.

Brother Gilroy, too, sees his life undone and re-made by this fateful creature known as Alice Cooper. The two fall in love in a wondrous melding of mind and body. Both are transformed. Their love story is rich and complete; they build a new world that is magical in its intensity.

But no matter how deep and abiding it is, their love cannot long serve as a refuge for either of them. For not only are two deadly, embittered men after Alice Cooper…her actions have also infuriated the government, which (like the media) draws up in a snapping, snarling circle around Holy Mansion Monastery.

Inevitably, they all come together for the reckoning—the deranged husband, the vengeful state trooper, the government forces…and, of course, Brother Gilroy and Alice Cooper. As if worked by an invisible hand of retribution, the action culminates in a shocking bloodletting that almost destroys Holy Mansion.

So is The Real Alice Cooper Wants To Be Famous a compelling suspens

About the Author

Joseph J. Murphy is the Chairman of the Board of DCI Telecommunications, Inc. where he previously served as president and chief executive officer. Prior to that he was executive vice president and chief financial officer, and a member of the Board of Directors of Aquarion Company. Formerly, he was chief financial officer for Connecticut Energy Corp., a member of Price Waterhouse and an officer in the United States Marine Corps from 1961 to 1964. He was a member of the Board of Directors of Boys/Girls Club of Bridgeport and served on the economic advisory board for Fairfield University and Sudden Death Syndrome (SIDS) for Fairfield County. He was also a member of the FBI/Marine Corps Association. He holds a BS and MBA from Iona College in New York.