Chimpanzee

In Noise, Bradley's first novel, groups of young people learned that in the static of now defunct analog television broadcasts, some person or group was laying down rules for how to survive an imminent breakdown of society. The rulebook lay out the necessary stockpiling of food and weaponry, but it most important lessons were in ruthlessness. When the collapse begins, we see how well the group Bradley created has absorbed these lessons.

Chimpanzee is a not a sequel to the first novel, but Bradley has stated it is part of a "thematic cluster." The collapse has not led to anarchy. The world has settled into what is called The Second Great Depression, and the government has taken the necessary measures to maintain a tenuous control. Many of the unemployed find a place in government-sponsored Renewel service. But this is no WPA. Renewel employees are working off debts by doing menial, manual labor that is in stark contrast to the professions they once held. They are also conscripted to become Monitors, spies expected to report insurgent or merely suspicious behavior.

Cade, the hero of the novel, has learned that his PhD in literary theory did not guarantee him a job in academia. He has been ordered to report to Renewal. But in what is both Bradley's funniest and creepiest invention, he must pay off his student loans by undergoing Repossession Therapy. Over a series of sessions, his therapist will use newly invented technology to remove everything that Cade learned at University, starting with the most advanced work he did for his PhD.

Life in the Depression goes on. Stores are seriously understocked, but Cade, his wife, and their friends still meet in pubs for beers, go to movies, got to clubs to hear new bands, and attend parties. There are hiking trips to state parks. And there is the new pastime called "chimping." Chimping incorporates goggles similar to what Cade wears in his therapy sessions. When you chimp, you put them on and choose from a menu of moods and experiences. His first time out, Cade learns that "paranoia" is not a good choice.

Meanwhile, Cade's wife still has her mathematics professorship at the local university. With her income they look to buy one of the many bargain-priced homes among the foreclosed properties on offer. They also plan to have a baby.

Cade is bored. He begins teaching impromptu classes in rhetoric and literary theory in a nearby park. Informal outdoor classes have become something of a fad, and he wants to make some use of his education before Repossession Therapy takes it away. He attracts a crowd of young people surprisingly eager to learn what he has to say about rhetoric and literary theory. Monitors observe but do not interfere--that is until they do. His young students introduce Cade to an underground society living in squats and developing their own monetary system. Cade thinks of himself as an outside observer with this crowd, but revolution is brewing. Cade is getting pulled into its vortex.

Bradley's has not titled his novel after the "chimping" technology that plays a larger and larger role in it. Rather chimping itself seems to reference the stickers and spray-painted stencils of a screaming chimpanzee head that have become a prevalent form of graffiti. It's meaning remains elusive, but it follows the first dictate of Cade's instruction to his students. You begin by getting your audience's attention.