One of Tech’s own professors released a novel this summer, both to critical praise and controversial debate.

Paul Lake, an English and creative writing professor, released "Cry Wolf: A Political Fable", an animal fable in the vein of "Animal Farm". While Orwell’s satire concerned communism, Lake turned the looking glass toward America.

“It’s an animal fable, so it can be interpreted in various ways, but it’s about Western civilization and where it’s going right now,” Lake said. “It’s a political fable but it’s also a fable about much deeper things.”

"Cry Wolf" concerns a peaceful farm, Green Pastures, run by farm animals after their owner’s death. When a wounded doe arrives on the farm seeking shelter, the domesticated animals must decide whether to allow the wild animal to pass. From there, the animals are presented with an increasingly difficult set of decisions, all with political undertones, which threaten the animals’ way of life.

Despite the label on professors for liberal-mindedness, Lake’s novel defends conservative viewpoints throughout, symbolized through the degradation of the farm through outside sources—and even some within.

“[I wrote "Cry Wolf"] because it was what I felt and thought at the time,” Lake said. “The perception of all professors is that they’re of the left, but that’s not necessarily the case.”

Lake wrote the novel in a seven-month period between July of 2006 and February of 2007, writing in the evenings after work or after taking his son to cross-country or wrestling meets.

“It’s the easiest, fastest book I’ve ever written,” Lake said. “I guess because it’d been brewing in my mind for a while. But for some reason I just felt a sense of mastery and control over the novel in one sense. In another sense, I felt like I had no control whatsoever—it was just coming to me, almost like a movie I was transcribing into words.”

"Cry Wolf" was published to solid reception from media outlets. "Booklist" gave Lake a positive review, citing the superiority of Cry Wolf to its Orwellian predecessor. “Lake writes vividly and characterizes shrewdly, producing an anti-immigration fable more polished than Orwell’s anti-Communist satire.”

Laurie Morrow, a political columnist for "The Montpelier Bridge" says, “What seems, at first, a gentle fable about farm animals who enjoy a kind of ordered liberty, turns quickly into a grim allegory about man’s dark impulse toward the collective.” The "New England Review" praised the book, calling it “a modern classic deserving wide recognition.” The Reverend John Newhaus, editor-in-chief of "First Things", calls it “A charming and chilling fable,” and Chronicles Magazine regarded Lake’s novel as “Cleverly devised and well developed.”

"The Nebo" will be hosting a book signing on Thursday, September 25, at 6:30 pm in room 275 of Witherspoon. The book will be available for $12.