Dollartorium
Pronouncing tidy morals concerning meaningful work, Dollartorium is a convivial satirical novel.
In Ron Pullins’s freewheeling satirical novel Dollartorium, an entrepreneur is lured by the prospect of wealth.
Ralph owns the Corny Doo Doggery, which he runs with his daughter Stella’s help. It’s a local favorite whose claim to fame is that content, mild-mannered Ralph “grows his own corn and raises his own pigs.” Ralph’s wife, Phyllis, dreams of having more and comes up with ideas to turn a greater profit, like selling frozen products, most of which Ralph rejects.
The family’s world changes when the Money Master leaps out of their television, selling admission to his Dollartorium—a cold gilded compound where people who are “half snake” or “half lizard” lounge, and where machinery feeds on delusions. As Ralph progresses through its get-rich training program to appease Phyllis, even though he’s plagued by self-doubt, he begins to embrace the Money Master’s cynical marketing lessons.
An amused outside narrator introduces the routine-prone characters and the Money Master’s pitch with patient relish. Much humor stems from this lucid point of view, which fosters intimate familiarity with Ralph’s grease-filled shop (vivified as a place where honest work reigns even as insatiability grows) and makes room for reflections on consumer culture too.
The characterizations are built upon fabulistic archetypes. Naive Ralph adores Plato and contemplates what it means to be good while he batters and fries corn dogs. Phyllis, who tends to the cash register, is enticed by televised game shows and their promises of easy winnings. She thinks that it’s her American right to vault out of the middle class. Purehearted Stella, meanwhile, is happy just running the shop. At their opposite is the charismatic Money Master—a patriotic infomercial evangelist whose behaviors are overnarrated, slowing the pace of Ralph’s indoctrination into the Dollartorium, which is certain to go awry.
Amid the fantasy setting of the Dollartorium, some contemporary political figures and habits are lampooned, including Fox News and those who wear MAGA gear; elsewhere, the Money Master promotes bankruptcy as a way to conduct business. Ralph is an impassive hero, though, who has to be rescued from the brainwashing by someone else. Further, Stella pontificates about worthwhile values, broadcasting the novel’s message in a too-forceful manner, and Phyllis’s about-face is underexplained.
In the entertaining satirical novel Dollartorium, a family’s sense of good fortune evolves as they learn to recognize the burdens of serving two masters.
Reviewed by
Karen Rigby
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