The Rise of the Dictator

The Fragility of Democracy (Book 1)

The Rise of the Dictator
Republic of Columbia, 2020–2025
When President Victor Trumbull—charismatic demagogue and master of the “Big Lie”—refuses to concede the 2020 election, the Republic of Columbia gasps. Courtrooms ring with baseless lawsuits, state officials are coerced to “find” votes, and a mob storms the Capitol in scenes not witnessed for two centuries. Democracy survives the night… but the wound festers.
From the marbled corridors of Congress to the glare of prime-time television, insiders confront an agonizing choice: loyalty or conscience.

• Senator Larry Rhodes, consummate power-broker, knows Trumbull is poison—yet can he defy the man who commands his party’s rage?
• Elaine Buchanan, tireless fixer, orchestrates back-channel schemes while her own doubts threaten to surface.
• Investigative reporter Marcia Davenport hunts the secret “Restoration Plan,” a blueprint to purge the government and enthrone Trumbull forever.
• And principled Congresswoman Karen Li discovers how steep the price of truth can be.

As new “election-integrity” laws erode guardrails and shadow militias pledge allegiance to a single man, the 2024 vote becomes a high-wire act over an abyss. One misstep, one whispered deal, and the Charter that once bound a nation could unravel.
Blending the urgency of today’s headlines with the pulse-pounding tension of a political thriller, The Rise of the Dictator chronicles the five harrowing years when a republic teetered—and shows how swiftly a strongman’s ambition can turn doubt into dogma, and a democracy into a memory.
Will the last defenders of Columbia’s ideals hold the line—or herald the dawn of an elected tyrant?