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The Fall of the Nixon Administration, IS NOT ABOUT POLITICS…OR IS IT?

Set in 1974 on the eve of Nixon’s resignation and told from the perspectives of the very four eccentric women—CeCe LaRue, Mimi, Marlayna, and Lindia Johnson—Hudson tells a satirical tale of love, greed, hypocrisy, war, spirituality, and social mores—skewering notions of what is “proper” and “acceptable.” Suzanne Hudson’s novel, The Fall of the Nixon Administration, is a comic romp with a Cast of Characters straight out of a madhouse.

CeCe LaRue (Cecelia): a selfish, pity-proud, put-upon priss-pot:

In light of my current situation with the law, I suppose it’s a good thing I did not shoot Will Luckie in the back of the head when I had the chance. And anything else that happened today was strictly a crime of passion, as you will see once you have all the facts. The only thing that even came close to resembling premeditation was my momentary lapse, a fleeting intention to blow Will Luckie’s brains out, and I obviously did not do that.

Winston: CeCe’s closeted, gay, doctor husband, Winston

Mimi (Maureen): CeCe’s outrageous mother—wealthy, widowed, and randy:

I have often wondered over the years if Cecelia LaRue Calhoun were not fathered by some stranger who drugged me unconscious then had his way with my pliant flesh—flesh that momentarily encased a rare, ripened ovary, as CeCe was the product of my only pregnancy. This stranger could have been anyone—a rapaciously randy Fuller Brush salesman, for example, or an errant milkman who harbored milky lust among the clattering bottles.

Will Luckie: a crude yet sensitive chicken-loving pansexual gigolo and the much younger Vietnam veteran with whom Mimi has “taken up” to CeCe’s shock and humiliation

Marlayna: Will’s jilted stalker of an ex-girlfriend, a fundamentalist Christian and part time bar slut prone to hysterical/delusional pregnancies:

I was brought up to love the Lord, love God and country, and take no shit off of nobody. I don’t suffer no fools and the long hairs can kiss my lily white ass, putting the American flag on the butts of their jeans, smoking their wacky weed, and spitting on our military men. I’m proud to be an Okie from Muskogee, if you get my drift.

GooGoo McGeehee: Vietnam veteran, PTSD-ridden, conspiracy-theory believer who “coaches” Marlayna’s on stalking.

Lindia Johnson: A widowed maid—kind, patient, and level-headed—the “real” Christian who puts it all into perspective:

Will keeps on telling me I need me some loving. That’s just how he talks to everybody. Thinks loving is the answer to all the ills of the world. And I reckon he’s right, only it’s been so long since I studied about it—a man’s loving, I mean. It’s been so long because I ain’t missed it too bad until here lately. See, I already had what precious few women get. I had the love of, not just a man, but a good man. A man of God. Can’t nobody give a woman the kind of loving a preacher man can, and can’t nobody take my man’s place.

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT HUDSON’S LATEST NOVEL…

“Suzanne Hudson in her raucous new novel Suzanne Hudson has conjured a girl-cousin for Ignatius Reilly and rendered her obscene and outrageous. CeCe is a comedic queen, consorting with a covey of femme fatales, while confessing to one sane and saintly housekeeper, Lindia. Oh, and the man-in-the-middle? That too-good-looking Will Luckie, well, he loves on pet chickens named after Nixon’s cabinet, and some there who think they gotta go! LOL! This book is at once hilarious and salvific.” – Sonny Brewer, author of The Poet of Tolstoy Park

“Thank you, Suzanne . . . for understanding and voicing all these whackadoodle people and giving us a rollicking good yarn. With a bite.”-John M. Williams, prize-winning author of fiction, nonfiction, and the musical play (with Rheta Grimsley Johnson) Hiram: Becoming Hank

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