Uncle Moe and the Martha’s Vineyard Frackers

“In this sequel to Fish Food, Jim Loy gives us another wonky tale peopled by strange and wondrous characters as Uncle Moe takes on a group of evil frackers …”
- Hayes Brandwell, The Polemicist Post

Moe Thibault is a lovable octogenarian who sometimes thinks he’s Jacques Clouseau and who’s convinced he once had an identical twin. While living out his widower’s retirement in upstate New York, Moe is sent an obituary from Martha’s Vineyard with a photo of his apparent Doppelganger, a man named Leroi Uxem. Could this have been his long-lost brother? In an effort to find out, Moe contacts Dr. Michael Uxem on the Vineyard and wangles an invitation for a visit. DNA tests ultimately prove that Moe and Leroi were indeed brothers, and his newfound family welcomes Moe. The rest of Moe’s story might have read “happily ever after” had it not been for the appearance on the Vineyard of energy prospectors intent on setting up a fracking operation. As a Senior Richter Minister of the Church of Seismology, Moe considers fracking to be a sin against the Earth and God—a deity who Moe believes is female and properly called Yolanda. Accordingly, he begins a campaign to stop the frackers before they can make a shambles of the island. His associates include Mike Uxem and his wife Nicki, Moe’s niece Velma Trailer, Artie Wetzo (a pal of Leroi’s), and Larry Hitch, Moe’s former business associate and the owner of a sex-obsessed monkey. Can they foil the frackers? Will Yolanda kick butt and take names like she did at Pompeii two millennia ago? If you like irreverent stories with zany characters, Uncle Moe and the Martha’s Vineyard Frackers just might be for you.

James D. Loy taught physical anthropology at the University of Rhode Island from 1974-2010 where he studied the social behavior of monkeys. In the mid-90s, he shifted his research to a biography of Charles Darwin’s wife (J. D. Loy and Kent M. Loy, 2010, Emma Darwin: A Victorian Life, University Press of Florida). Jim and his wife are enjoying retirement in the beautiful Appalachian mountains.