Publisher's Synopsis
The year is 2040. The place, New York City in the Reformed States of America. The nation has been restructured, allowing anyone over the age of nineteen equal opportunities in life regardless of age, gender, race, culture, religion, and/or sexual orientation. It is an idyllic system that promotes social mobility; a tiered structure based solely on one's aptitudes as measured by the Life Test, a mandatory Exam all must take before turning nineteen and every four years thereafter to maintain quality control. The reward for passing allows one to earn and keep the Existence License: a permit to "Live" in and be a contributing member of society as a Citizen. The penalty of failure, however, is Decommission, where one is sentenced to social "Death" in the Underworld, a living hell of various life-long labors which support the infrastructure and comforts of Citizens. As Clayton Jackson Miller is about to discover, "Life" is not something to be taken for granted.Raised in the affluent Scarsdale neighborhood; former all-star varsity quarterback; perfect looks, body, oversexed, and a monster-sized... ego - he has it all. Until the eve of his nineteenth birthday, when Clay takes the Test - and fails. The government keeps careful watch on everyone, though, and while he may not meet the requirements to be an upstanding "Citizen," he does have certain assets that can serve elsewhere. Sentenced to life as a sex-worker in a luxurious facility deep under Manhattan, discarded by the world above, Clayton must come to terms with his new existence. Stripped of the life and name he knew, can the newly-minted "Jock" find purpose, meaning, and perhaps even love in the salacious world of flesh for fantasy? Or will it be the true death of him?
