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The Ambassador Takes One for the Team explores, humorously and tragically, the divine and the alien—and in doing so, the muddled, mixed mess that is humanity. By turns hilarious and hideous (frequently both at once!), these narratives are presented in a deceptively colloquial matter-of-fact voice.

And if you are one of those wacky species
That believes in an afterlife
I guess you'll never know
You were wrong about that too.

The unfortunate (mostly) human (mostly) speakers often don’t do well in their interactions with gods, other lifeforms, or the unknown—and those interactions tell us about our entirely human problems. Even those entities who interact successfully (from their point of view, at least) teach us more about ourselves than the ostensible narrator. We’re all ambassadors here, wherever we go—but sometimes acting on behalf of huge mistakes.

We need something to take our minds off
What we’re doing to ourselves,
Since we evidently
Don’t intend to stop.

David C. Kopaska-Merkel is coming from a solid and evident background in hard science, which he has no hesitation in distorting or subverting. His clever, wonderful poems will take your mind off your troubles, all right—by giving you some new and unusual concepts to mull over and digest with enjoyment.

—F. J. Bergmann, former editor of Star*Line and winner of SFPA’s Elgin and Rhysling Awards

$7 postpaid to jopnquog@gmail.com via paypal

Update: every penny I get from sales of this book, rounded up to the nearest $10, goes to Planned Parenthood for the forseeable future.