A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR

I’ve been a fan of thrillers for many years. While nonfiction books aim to enlighten, the goal of most thrillers is to entertain. But there is a category of novels that do both: “faction”‑ completely fictional books with plots rooted in fact, and that is the category I strived for with The Overton Window.

As you become immersed in the story, certain scenes and characters will likely feel familiar to you. That is intentional, as this story takes place during a time in American history very much like the one we find ourselves living in now. But while many of the facts embedded in the plot are true (see the afterword for details), the scenarios I create as a result of those facts, along with the way things are tied together and the conclusions that are drawn, are entirely fictional.

Let’s hope they stay that way.

I know this book will be controversial; anything that causes people to think usually is. In this case, I hope that you are forced not only to think, but also to research, read history, and ask questions outside of your comfort zone. It will ultimately be up to each of us to search out our own truths.

While this may go without saying even once, I feel the need to say it again: This is a work of fiction. As such some of the characters in this book express opinions that I not only disagree with, but vehemently oppose. I included them in the story because these views, like them or not, are part of the current American dialogue. Ignoring them, or pretending that radical ideas don’t exist in society, does all of us a great disservice. Silencing voices or opinions only pushes them to the shadows and darkness, where they can fester and grow even stronger.

You may also notice that the words Republican or Democrat rarely appear in this book, and when they do, it’s in an equally unflattering light. We also never meet the president of the United States or learn what party he or she is affiliated with. Those were conscious decisions, and it reflects the fact that what is happening to our country is not about a political party or a particular person, it is about a course of destruction that we have been pursuing at various speeds for the last century. Every day that we scream “Where were you four years ago? ” or “It’s your party’s fault and not mine! ” or “I didn’t vote for him! ” is a day we move closer to the end of America‑ or at least the America our Founders envisioned.

As I write this introduction, weeks before this book will even go on sale, I already know that my critics will be fierce and unforgiving. They will accuse me of being every kind of conspiracy theorist they can invent‑ and they will base it all on the plot of a novel that they likely never even read.

Fortunately, none of this is about me. It never has been. I’ve been called every hateful thing there is to call someone and I can handle it. But when all is said and done and people look back at this time in the history of our great country, there’s only one thing I hope that everyone, critics and fans alike, call me…

Wrong.

Enjoy the book; I hope that it costs you as much sleep reading it as it cost me creating it.

Freedom had been hunted round the globe;

reason was considered as rebellion;

and the slavery of fear had made men afraid to think.

But such is the irresistible nature of truth,

that all it asks, and all it wants,

is the liberty of appearing.

– THOMAS PAINE,

The Rights of Man, 1791

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