The Event

The Event traces the development by a Harvard professor of a biological agent which some members of Congress and the military convert into a weapon. The CIA and the Russian government both come to suspect an illegal operation. Their spies circle each other, with deadly results.

When President Sarah Peters begins to learn of this unauthorized project, the military resorts to murder of American citizens to keep the secret and ultimately releases the weapon into the water supply of Russian-controlled Ukraine, with devastating effect. The President takes a dangerous personal trip to Russia to defuse the crisis. Global war is averted at the cost of imposition of draconian political limitations designed to prevent future rogue operations which risk world destruction, including institution of new criminal law courts to punish people whose actions create such risk. This dictatorial legal system is imposed on the United States, its operation revealed by a trial of an innocent junior scientist where perverted standards of justice risk her very life.

Set in Boston, Washington D.C., Moscow and the Ukrainian countryside, The Event exposes the fragility of peace and the risk of tyranny in an increasingly complex world.

Stephen M. Honig is a poet, prose author and practicing attorney. His professional career has included representation of companies designing and testing biologics, and time spent in many of the places in which "The Event" is set, including Boston, Washington D.C., Russia and the somber plains of Kursh separating Southwestern Russia from Ukraine. Mr. Honig has published five books of poetry (at the date of publication of "The Event", he serves on the Board of the New England Poetry Club), and has published a collection of short stories entitled "Noir Ain't the Half of It". "The Event" is his first novel. Mr. Honig resides in Newton, Massachusetts with his wife, youngest of four children, and his recalcitrant cocker-poo.