Apex Hides the Hurt: A Novel

In search of a new name for their town, the Winthrop town council decides to hire a nomenclature consultant best known for his crowning achievement, Apex, a multicultural bandage that has revolutionized the adhesive bandage industry, in a tour de force exploring the mysteries of identity, history, and marketing. Reprint.
The town of Winthrop has decided it needs a new name. The resident software millionaire wants to call it New Prospera; the mayor wants to return to the original choice of the founding black settlers; and the town’s aristocracy sees no reason to change the name at all. What they need, they realize, is a nomenclature consultant. And, it turns out, the consultant needs them. But in a culture overwhelmed by marketing, the name is everything and our hero’s efforts may result in not just a new name for the town but a new and subtler truth about it as well.