At one point while designing the Banana Republic board game, I started wondering how the litlle country got to where it was. How did it, f'r instance, initially become independent? And how did it go from being at peace with itself to the point where it became a self-consuming, dessicated prize for power hungry li'l dictators? After much pondering and speculation, I decided there was really only one way to find out, and that was to write a novel and see what happened. So I did.

The result is The Year Zero, the first (probably; hopefully) in the Banana Republic series of novels. This one doesn't get beyond independence; but don't worry, I'm just as curious to know what happened next.

Astute observers may notice some discrepancies between the novel and the board game. All I can say is that what may work in the broad strokes of a board game is not necessarily suited for the finer brush of a novel.

So please, enjoy the novel. Any comments or feedback (reviews, parcel bombs, money, etc.) are welcome too. The first part is available here. Download the complete novel as an ebook. It's all for free. 

It's in pdf format, so you'll need Adobe Acrobat (also free and available here) to read it.

Carl-Ben Louw

NEXT PAGE