The Astral Projection Conspiracy

Second Edition

The Astral Projection Conspiracy Clive Brown returns to Vancouver from Fort St. John in the spring of 2008 to reconnect with his transsexual parent, George Brown (formerly Maria Ferguson). Clive Brown is a conservative-leaning individual, an avid skateboarder, coffee fanatic and a huge CSI fan. He idolizes the television actor, David Caruso. Clive has strong social convictions – he is writing a book about the harmful effects created by drugs. When Clive arrives in Vancouver, he stays in The Britannica – a grungy East Vancouver hotel – on the advice of the Evangelist, Anthony Barbara. Konrad Bent, a taxi driver and a Dext, drives Clive to the Britannica. The Dexts are a Port Seymour motorcycle gang owned by the Price family. The crime family also controls the Astral Projection Conspiracy, a fake hippy cult on the fictional British Columbian island, Departure Island. The Evangelists are an apparent enemy Christian gang warring against the Price family. Clive shares his cheap hotel room with a strange dreadlocked man – an elderly sorcerer better known as Gravely Durham Price, who rules the Price crime family in Port Seymour BC with his three sons – Graham, Dick and Robbie Price. Gravely Price is a self-styled shaman from Port Seymour, a mythical city on Vancouver Island. The Doctor once served with the British army in Borneo in the 1960s. Price frequently spins army tales to anyone who will listen. Gravely Price is also a mystic Satanist. He is able to control people through hypnosis, however the bulk of the Doctor's so-called magic centres around the use of chemical drugs and other psychological manipulations. George/Maria Brown has a connection to the Doctor through his father Dr. Alec Ferguson. Alec Ferguson taught biology to Konrad Bent. George's father also invented a mind control drug called 'whitener' in the 1970s. The drug recipe contains BZ – a hallucinogen investigated by the US army at the Edgewood Arsenal – and potent tinctures of peyote, cocaine, Devil's Breath and an over-the-counter cough medicine containing DMX. George, an avid gambler, owes a significant amount of money to the CanadaWest casino in Vancouver – an establishment owned by the Doctor's family. Clive travels to Departure Island to rescue George from the Astral Projection Conspiracy cult. However, when the skater arrives on the island, Clive discovers he's too late to help George. By the novel's end, Clive Brown finds himself on the opposite side of the drug war. He also learns how to Astral Project through time-holes.