The Terrible Fours

When Ishmael Reed wrote The Terrible Twos about the American infantile need for instant gratification, he could not have realized that during the week of June 29, 2020, journalist Nicole Wallace would be referring to a president as a "toddler."

Part science fiction, part Washington Novel and part Christmas Novel, The Terrible Fours follows The Terrible Twos (1982) and The Terrible Threes (1989). Some characters have been dropped and some of the principals are back. St. Nicholas is here, but his sidekick Black Peter, who appeared in The Terrible Twos, has been shelved to the Epilog. In The Terrible Threes, former president Dean Clift, removed from office after a bizarre television address, disappeared with his entourage while en route to resume his presidency after Supreme Court justice, Nola Payne, casts the vote declaring that his removal from office under the 25th Amendment was unconstitutional. Televangelist Clement-Jones still runs the White House and continues to humiliate his hand-picked president Jesse Hatch whom he is blackmailing.

"The Rapture," that Jones and figurehead president Jesse Hatch promised, hasn't arrived. Realizing that the Catholic Church has been losing adherents in the global north while gaining adherents in the global south, the College of Cardinals has elected a black pope, Miltiades II, named after Miltiades I, the Black African pope. Miltiades II had replaced the cardinal of New York, who was demoted for extravagant living. Boy Bishop and the NIX, a cult that worships oceans, are back.

The citizens of the planet Dido await an invasion from Earth after their earthlike planet has been detected. An alien in the body of a deceased television producer works inside the government and attempts to disrupt the invasion. Termite Control, a follower of Odin, and a necrophiliac, who was dismissed as a political threat in The Terrible Threes , is gaining in the polls. Billionaires and a few trillionaires plan to secretly leave Earth, which is running out of resources, to search for raw materials elsewhere. They aim to reach Dido in privately financed space ships. Virginia Saturday, Nance's ex wife, J.Q., and the fake Rasta who stole Black Peter's identity are back. And more and more and more.