''Good News'' is a 1980

novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...

by Edward Abbey. ''Good News'' is Abbey's only work of

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

and can be considered a distant sequel to

The Brave Cowboy ''The Brave Cowboy'' (1956) was Edward Abbey's second published novel. In 1993 Dream Garden Press produced a special limited edition of the book that includes an introduction by Kirk Douglas, who was the star in the film based on the book. I ...

Summary

It is set in a

Phoenix, Arizona Phoenix ( ; nv, Hoozdo; es, Fénix or , yuf-x-wal, Banyà:nyuwá) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities and towns in Arizona#List of cities and towns, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arizona, with 1 ...

of the near future after the economy and government have collapsed. Small bands of people (including Jack Burns, previously from ''

'') are trying to live freely, but a would-be

military dictator A military dictatorship is a dictatorship in which the military exerts complete or substantial control over political authority, and the dictator is often a high-ranked military officer. The reverse situation is to have civilian control of the m ...

has other plans and is trying to set up a

dictatorship A dictatorship is a form of government which is characterized by a leader, or a group of leaders, which holds governmental powers with few to no limitations on them. The leader of a dictatorship is called a dictator. Politics in a dictatorship are ...

using Phoenix as his base.

Publication history

The book was first published in October 1980 with 242 pages and later reissued in January 1991 with 256 pages by Plume.

References

Novels by Edward Abbey 1980 American novels 1980 science fiction novels Dystopian novels Novels set in Phoenix, Arizona E. P. Dutton books {{1980s-ah-novel-stub