The Lecturer's Tale

The author of "Publish and Perish" returns with a Faustian tale of the horrors of academe. The perfect-pitch blend of satire and horror, it is the story of an English lecturer who gets the axe at his job, loses his finger in a freak accident, and then finds that he has acquired a strange power: he can force his will onto others with the touch of his reattached finger.

Nelson Humboldt is a visiting adjunct English lecturer at prestigious Midwest University, until he is unceremoniously fired one autumn morning. Minutes after the axe falls, his right index finger is severed in a freak accident. Doctors manage to reattach the finger, but when the bandages come off, Nelson realizes that he has acquired a strange power--he can force his will onto others with a touch of his finger. And so he obtains an extension on the lease of his university-owned townhouse and picks up two sections of freshman composition, saving his career from utter ruin. But soon these victories seem inconsequential, and Nelson's finger burns for even greater glory. Now the Midas of academia wonders if he can attain what every struggling assistant professor and visiting lecturer covets--tenure. "The Lecturer's Tale" is a pitch-perfect blend of satire and horror.