Mid-January 2004 I’m anticipating the reaction, monitoring the media waves from my cubicle. Peoria and Healy’s story is met with silence. Nothing. Doesn’t crack the ether. Doesn’t make The Magazine part of the conversation. Doesn’t move the debate or get any television hits or radio hits. No responses from the White House or the State Department. Even Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch shrug it off. The Magazine’s public relations department is disinclined to touch it. Nobody wants this story. Complaining about Iraq when Saddam Hussein has been captured? Three days, nothing. What happens during those three days? The Magazine goes global. It is translated into six different languages: Polish, Russian, Korean, Japanese, Turkish, and Arabic. By Thursday, an Islamic cleric in Najaf, a man who you wouldn’t think would be in the magazine’s target demographic—though, to be honest, by the year 2004, anyone who picks up the magazine is welcomed into its demographic—has a copy in his hands.
What do You think about The Last Magazine: A Novel?
