Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Dr. Bloodmoney is set in a post-apocalyptic future. In 1974, before the start of the narrative, Dr. Bruno Bluthgeld (German for "Blood-Money") had led a project testing nuclear weapons as a protectionary measure against Communist China and the Soviet Union. However, a miscalculation caused an atmospheric nuclear accident leading to widespread fallout and mutations. More recently the United States has been involved in a prolonged period of hostilities with China and the Soviet Union erupting in a war in Cuba.
In 1981, the now universally hated Bluthgeld seeks psychotherapy with Dr. Stockstill for his paranoia and guilt. Meanwhile Stuart McConchie, Hoppy Harrington, and Jim Fergesson, employees at Modern TV Sales and Service in Berkeley, California, go through a fairly typical day, pausing to watch Walt and Lydia Dangerfield being launched into orbit in the first stage of a colonization mission to Mars. Suddenly, this typical day is disrupted by a massive nuclear strike. Orbiting overhead, Walt Dangerfield witness the tragic events as they unfold, while other characters are reduced to desperate measures in their struggle for survival. Fergesson is killed as his shop collapses. Meanwhile, Bluthegeld is convinced that he caused the strike in response to a universal conspiracy against him; believing that he has shown the world his power, he sets out to heal and restore order through his imagined magical powers.
The narrative jumps to 1988, when many communities have begun to rebuild a sort of order. A military government has arisen in Cheyenne, Wyoming, while in California government is by local community councils that view one another with varying degrees of hostility. Most pre-war technology and amenities have been lost. Oil shortages have disabled cars, which are thereafter pulled by horses or are fitted with wood burning engines, and former California ranch territory has been converted into agricultural land for corn and other crops. Human mutants have become more common, such as phocomeli, as well as collateral conjoined symbiotes. At the same time, former domestic animals like dogs and cats have undergone mutations that enhance their intelligence, but have turned into ferocious tribal units of their own. Some dogs are capable of speech, while some cats may have developed their own language.
Walt Dangerfield, supplied with adequate rations to last him for the rest of his life, as well as a treasury of books and music recordings, has become a disc jockey in orbit. His broadcasts help provide some sense of continuity with pre-war civilization in the isolated settlements that comprise the postwar world. His wife Lydia committed suicide at some point during the intervening period. Dangerfield has begun to experience symptoms of an unknown medical condition, causing some of his listeners to worry.
In Marin County survivors including Bonny Keller, Dr. Stockstill, June Raub, and Hoppy Harrington have organised into a self-governing community. Harrington, still resentful of the prejudice he felt before the war, has become a successful mechanic thanks to his psychokinetic powers, intending to force the community to become indebted to him and consequently to respect him. He has also has been using his powers to gradually kill Walt Dangerfield in order to take over Dangerfield's transmissions. Meanwhile, Bluthegeld, under the assumed name of Jack Tree, lives as a sheep farmer outside the community. In order to protect Bluthegeld and the community's interests, they have had to kill several interlopers.
Stuart McConchie has become a travelling entrepreneur in the post-apocalyptic world, selling "smart" robotic rat traps for a company based in post-war Berkeley. Still holding onto his ambitious pre-war salesman's mentality, McConchie travels to Marin County to meet Andrew Gill, a cigarette and alcohol entrepreneur, to discuss the re-introduction of automation within his factory as an agent of Berkeley-based business interests. His appearance in West Marin startles Hoppy Harrington and Bruno Bluthegeld, both of whom had last seen McConchie on the day of the strike.
Bluthgeld's increasing psychosis eventually leads to the discovery of his identity, and Hoppy, viewing him as a potential rival, kills him with his powers. The Marin County council decides to thank Hoppy by presenting him with gifts of Gill's tobacco and alcohol and a monument in Hoppy's honor, but Hoppy scorns these gifts as being much less than he deserves. Bonny Keller begins to worry that Hoppy will begin to exercise a dictatorial authority, and leaves the county with Gill and McConchie, hoping to escape from his power.
Meanwhile, Edie Keller's conjoined twin brother Bill, a sentient fetus within her body, has been yearning for an independent body. He also is able to communicate telepathically with the dead, who warn him how dangerous Hoppy is. When Edie approaches Hoppy's house, Hoppy uses his powers to draw Bill outside her, where he travels through several forms, eventually usurping Hoppy's body and causing him to die.
At the conclusion of the book, Dr. Stockstill begins a course of psychotherapy, broadcast over the radio, with Walt Dangerfield, who may be recovering from his illness.
