Wizard Ho‪!‬

The search for the meaning of the 20th Century concludes, along with the effort to resurrect Columbia.


A merry band of creative Manhattanites from the Chelsea neighborhood spends the 1990’s searching for a Wizard and his sidekick, Ripple, who operate a clandestine radio station. The station represents the embattled voice of the twentieth century intent on identifying the American soul and the ideal of a bountiful nation represented by Columbia, once our national symbol. 


An interracial couple, Jim Mahoney and Columbia Ruth Morisong, inspire and lead a parade of dancers, musicians, writers, videographers and film buffs to find these radio mavericks. Searching through the glittering upheaval of New York’s post-postmodernism that closes out the millennium, this colorful crew of New Yorkers defines the urban personality at the end of the century, when it was thought that history had perfected a happy ending.


Wizard Ho! is the story of this quest. It is the seventh and last novel in a string that follows the Mahoney family through the twentieth century. Beginning in Iowa in 1906 and moving to Chicago and later to the suburbs of New York, the Columbiad series illustrates how people learned to cope in a time of war and nuclear and fascistic anxiety and still remain whole and authentic. 


As 1999 dissolves, Jim and Ruth battle to survive into the new age.