The Color Of His Coat

About the Book

Nick Kuhnen starts as a fairly typical American academic (naive, egocentric, opinionated, somewhat objectionable).  His world is indeed the "ivory tower," where one's biggest threat is the disapproval of his fellows.  A bit to the Right of the mainstream, he thinks he has an adventurous lifestyle, but he is only marginally different from the Herd.  He is slightly aware something is wrong, but more interested in his own sarcastic humor than in constructive engagement.

His humor gets him in hot water.  Nick is a popular critic, and one of his targets, another anthropologist, now holds a government post.  Nick's barbs bring covert attempts at retribution.

The Administration of US President Max McVicar is statist-paranoid:  Clinton meets Nixon meets Slobodan Miloisevich.  McVicar's fascist leanings, and the existence of a Nixon-style "enemies list," bring in the Russians, who are concerned about the risk to world peace a fascist America would pose.  The KGB courier chosen to shadow Nick (known world-wide for his writings on terrorists and resistance movements) is a young lady who immediately falls for him.  Their unlikely relationship (see chapter 9, where he takes her to a faculty luncheon!) works brilliantly, and they both find real joy.

Just like his research subjects, Nick's Katrina is a highly competent person with a real life.  Nick meets other highly competent people, including William, King of England, and members of British Intelligence (like Gerald Simpson, a cross between Vivian Richards, Daley Thompson, and James Bond).  He meets officials he likes, ones he does not, and ones that do not like him.  And, he discovers that where before he would have been unconcerned about being disliked, these people move him to self-examination, and toward change.  

A chain of circumstances (some based on real-life events) bring Nick one of his goals, the opportunity to do ethnographic fieldwork with a British regiment, in the U.S.  There we see him practicing his observational skills, and enjoying the chance to participate.

But the world does not stand still.  President McVicar continues his mayhem, and cities start to erupt.  The Secretary General of the U.N. warns that McVicar is practicing "ethnic cleansing," and the U.S. House of Representatives responds with a Bill of Impeachment.  McVicar's response is to muster his (illegal) militia, and, like a Lebanese or Serbian warlord, to take to the hills, as lawlessness erupts.  The Secretary General of the U.N. orders "all U.N. units" to assist in the capture of McVicar, and the King's Own Scottish Borderers move from their base in Missouri to comply.

But where is McVicar?  His militia, the "Keepers," had a website, "hacked" by a young man who's screen-name is REXW.  This man had sent some files to Nick, one, unknown at the time, containing the location of the President's hideout.  Yes, REXW turns out to be the King, though Nick doesn't know it.  Nick, in due time, remembers the file, and delivers it to Colonel Armstrong, commander of the KOSB.  

Off they go to Cheyenne Mountain, where Nick finds himself increasingly a participant -- and where the Borderers pull off a perfectly coordinated Reiver-style "snatch."  But the President's companion pulls a weapon on Nick, and is shot dead by Katrina, who, all this time had been carrying a handgun.  A minute later comes the climax -- as Nick is the only U.S. Citizen in the arresting party, he, "mister detached," must take legal responsibility with a citizen's arrest.  And he does.

This is, as I say in the introduction, a story of one man's growth, masquerading as a political/romantic adventure novel.  I have enjoyed the opportunity to create a familiar-feeling, unambiguous tale, in which the heroes are likeable, the villains disgustingly familiar, an

About the Author

Peter J. Nebergall is an anthropologist and journalist, with many nonfiction publications to his credit. THE COLOR OF HIS COAT is his first novel.