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Stepfather Bank
In a 22nd century world where the Bank owns everything, employs everyone, and governs by means of Credit, Monaghan Burlew scams his way through life without using Credit until the Bank tries to eliminate him and, as a result, ignites a revolution
- GenresFiction
288 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1987
7 people are currently reading
34 people want to read
About the author
David Poyer
82 books241 followersAka D.C. Poyer.
DAVID C. POYER was born in DuBois, PA in 1949. He grew up in Brockway, Emlenton, and Bradford, in western Pennsylvania, and graduated from Bradford Area High School in 1967. He graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1971, and later received a master's degree from George Washington University.
Poyer's active and reserve naval service included sea duty in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Arctic, Caribbean, and Pacific, and shore duty at the Pentagon, Surface Warfare Development Group, Joint Forces Command, and in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. He retired in July 2001.
Poyer began writing in 1976, and is the author of nearly fifty books, including THE MED, THE GULF, THE CIRCLE, THE PASSAGE, TOMAHAWK, CHINA SEA, BLACK STORM, THE COMMAND, THE THREAT, KOREA STRAIT, THE WEAPON, THE CRISIS, THE CRUISER, TIPPING POINT, HUNTER KILLER, DEEP WAR, OVERTHROW, VIOLENT PEACE, ARCTIC SEA, and THE ACADEMY, best-selling Navy novels; THE DEAD OF WINTER, WINTER IN THE HEART, AS THE WOLF LOVES WINTER, THUNDER ON THE MOUNTAIN, and THE HILL, set in Western Pennsylvania; and HATTERAS BLUE, BAHAMAS BLUE, LOUISIANA BLUE, and DOWN TO A SUNLESS SEA, underwater diving adventure.
Other noteworthy books are THE ONLY THING TO FEAR, a historical thriller, THE RETURN OF PHILO T. McGIFFIN, a comic novel of Annapolis, and the three volumes of The Civil War at Sea, FIRE ON THE WATERS, A COUNTRY OF OUR OWN, and THAT ANVIL OF OUR SOULS. He's also written two sailing thrillers, GHOSTING and THE WHITENESS OF THE WHALE. His work has been published in Britain, translated into Japanese, Dutch, Italian, Hugarian, and Serbo-Croatian; recorded for audiobooks, iPod downloads, and Kindle, and selected by the Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club and other book clubs. Rights to several properties have been sold or optioned for films, and two novellas appeared in the Night Bazaar series of fantasy anthologies.
Poyer has taught or lectured at Annapolis, Flagler College, University of Pittsburgh, Old Dominion University, the Armed Forces Staff College, the University of North Florida, Christopher Newport University, and other institutions. He has been a guest on PBS's "Writer to Writer" series and on Voice of America, and has appeared at the Southern Festival of Books and many other literary events. He taught in the MA/MFA in Creative Writing program at Wilkes University for sixteen years. He is currently core faculty at the Ossabaw Writers Retreat, a fellow of the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and a board member of the Northern Appalachia Review.
He lives on Virginia's Eastern Shore with novelist Lenore Hart.
DAVID C. POYER was born in DuBois, PA in 1949. He grew up in Brockway, Emlenton, and Bradford, in western Pennsylvania, and graduated from Bradford Area High School in 1967. He graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1971, and later received a master's degree from George Washington University.
Poyer's active and reserve naval service included sea duty in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Arctic, Caribbean, and Pacific, and shore duty at the Pentagon, Surface Warfare Development Group, Joint Forces Command, and in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. He retired in July 2001.
Poyer began writing in 1976, and is the author of nearly fifty books, including THE MED, THE GULF, THE CIRCLE, THE PASSAGE, TOMAHAWK, CHINA SEA, BLACK STORM, THE COMMAND, THE THREAT, KOREA STRAIT, THE WEAPON, THE CRISIS, THE CRUISER, TIPPING POINT, HUNTER KILLER, DEEP WAR, OVERTHROW, VIOLENT PEACE, ARCTIC SEA, and THE ACADEMY, best-selling Navy novels; THE DEAD OF WINTER, WINTER IN THE HEART, AS THE WOLF LOVES WINTER, THUNDER ON THE MOUNTAIN, and THE HILL, set in Western Pennsylvania; and HATTERAS BLUE, BAHAMAS BLUE, LOUISIANA BLUE, and DOWN TO A SUNLESS SEA, underwater diving adventure.
Other noteworthy books are THE ONLY THING TO FEAR, a historical thriller, THE RETURN OF PHILO T. McGIFFIN, a comic novel of Annapolis, and the three volumes of The Civil War at Sea, FIRE ON THE WATERS, A COUNTRY OF OUR OWN, and THAT ANVIL OF OUR SOULS. He's also written two sailing thrillers, GHOSTING and THE WHITENESS OF THE WHALE. His work has been published in Britain, translated into Japanese, Dutch, Italian, Hugarian, and Serbo-Croatian; recorded for audiobooks, iPod downloads, and Kindle, and selected by the Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club and other book clubs. Rights to several properties have been sold or optioned for films, and two novellas appeared in the Night Bazaar series of fantasy anthologies.
Poyer has taught or lectured at Annapolis, Flagler College, University of Pittsburgh, Old Dominion University, the Armed Forces Staff College, the University of North Florida, Christopher Newport University, and other institutions. He has been a guest on PBS's "Writer to Writer" series and on Voice of America, and has appeared at the Southern Festival of Books and many other literary events. He taught in the MA/MFA in Creative Writing program at Wilkes University for sixteen years. He is currently core faculty at the Ossabaw Writers Retreat, a fellow of the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and a board member of the Northern Appalachia Review.
He lives on Virginia's Eastern Shore with novelist Lenore Hart.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 6, 2018
Set several hundred years in the future, the global population is cared for and controlled by the Bank, a passionless artificial intelligence that is the sole corporation, government and authority in the world, having absorbed all other corporations, businesses, governments and religions into itself. It is opposed by the book's (anti)hero, Monaghan Burlew, an amusingly slovenly composer of anti-Bank doggerel.
As a dystopian vision, it owes a lot to Brave New World, sharing the concept of a completely rationally planned society where sterile safety, stability and empty happiness is guaranteed and the cost of freedom, but with these modulations: an economic emphasis -- credit and debit is the main lever of oppression -- and the entire populace is less *completely* soma-fied into complete compliance, as shown in those who start following Burlew's anti-Bank poems. Certainly the ever-increasing consolidation of today's corporations into a handful of megacorp monopolies resonates with the vision of the Bank, albeit without the Bank's global-rational-planning portion of the equation.
As a story, it makes an uneasy transition from the kind of zany satire tone of the beginning to a dark and grittier middle, but it also manages some great turns in the last third, incorporating some additional, unexpected science fiction ideas in a satisfying way, making it overall a worthwhile read.
As a dystopian vision, it owes a lot to Brave New World, sharing the concept of a completely rationally planned society where sterile safety, stability and empty happiness is guaranteed and the cost of freedom, but with these modulations: an economic emphasis -- credit and debit is the main lever of oppression -- and the entire populace is less *completely* soma-fied into complete compliance, as shown in those who start following Burlew's anti-Bank poems. Certainly the ever-increasing consolidation of today's corporations into a handful of megacorp monopolies resonates with the vision of the Bank, albeit without the Bank's global-rational-planning portion of the equation.
As a story, it makes an uneasy transition from the kind of zany satire tone of the beginning to a dark and grittier middle, but it also manages some great turns in the last third, incorporating some additional, unexpected science fiction ideas in a satisfying way, making it overall a worthwhile read.
July 19, 2013
More than interesting idea, more than unusual in execution. A rebel who lives outside his world's corporatist regime attempts to bring it down. While it's captivating and engaging, it's a little too disjointed and weird to be properly savoured.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews