THE MODERN DIVINE COMEDY Book 5: PURGATORIO 1 Entry

About the Book

The Purgatorio is the celestial afterworld where all people who die on Earth first immediately arrive to be purged and processed in their after-life by the Angels and Wise Prophets. The Journalist Romano as Adam & the ancient Prophet Zarathustra arrive to attend the Annual Lantern Parade in the attached Paradiso but will experience all the aspects of the Purgatorio before moving onto the Paradiso. The Café Graeco-Roman is the largest public café in the Celestial Kingdom where souls gather to discuss their personal, recreational and theological concerns amidst conspiratorial undercurrents led by the diabolical Devil and his tough-talking Three Crown Princes arriving as both undercover comedians and Garcons. The World’s main religions of Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Judaism, Shintoism, Zoroastrianism, Jainism, Sikhism, Christianity and Islam and the Primitive Religions as well are explored by both the Young French Professeur and the Extraordinary School Children. The Conspiracy Theorists are introduced while Celestial Tour Announcements about Guided Trips to Earth are permitted to those who qualify are given all day. A Literary Intermezzo is offered to display the literature greats forming their Literary Collective which include souls like Chaucer, Charles Dickens, the Grimm Brothers, Christopher Marlowe, Mary Shelley, Lady Murasaki, Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Louis Stevenson, Shakespeare, the Russian existentialists & others. Theological and Intellectual debates are also offered with the ancient Greek philosophers of Socrates & Plato & Aristotle to the modern thinkers Darwin, Richard Wagner, Friedrich Nietzsche, George Bernard Shaw, Voltaire, Rabelais & others. Ideologies and Faiths are also explored in Chapters with the subjects of the True Authorship of the Christian New Testament & the Higher Criticism of the Bible. GOD also has approved an Interstellar Scientific Project designed to explore the Universe with celestial physicists, mathematicians, bio-chemists, bio-technologists, behavioral scientists, political economists, philosophers, existentialists, theologians etc. all assisted by Albert Einstein among others.

About the Author

World traveler, writer, adventurer, entrepreneur, artist, romantic poet, Italian opera affezionato, ex-rugby player, and political animal! Andrew J. Farrara was born in Reading, Pa. in September 1950 and educated in the Reading School District. Coming-of-age in then-industrial Pennsylvania gave him an insatiable wanderlust. Since 1967 the author has traveled to over 135 countries and territories as determined by the Travelers’ Century Club lastly on a cruise from Genoa through the Suez Canal to the island of Mauritius and a flight to Madagascar, Ethiopia and England in 2019. He has visited all Seven Continents, including Antarctica, every State of the United States except North Dakota, and has conducted three around-the-world backpacking expeditions; for 8 weeks in 1983; 220 days in 1987-88; and 5 weeks in 2018. The second trip was the subject of his book entitled Around the World in 220 Days: Notes of an American Traveler Abroad published by Infinity Press in 2004. The author holds a BA in History and Political Science (1972) and an MA in Modern European History (1975) from Kutztown University, Pa. He taught social studies and history part-time in the Reading School District and at the Reading Area Community College before serving as an elected Reading School Board member from 1975 to 1977. Farrara served honorably in the Pennsylvania Air and Army National Guard from 1972 to 1978 as a Telecommunications Center Specialist in the 193rd Tactical Electronic Warfare Group at Middletown, Pa and as a Tank Crewman, Machine Gunner & Loader in the 103rd Armor & as an Infantry Soldier & Radio Operator in the 111th Infantry at the Kutztown Armory, Pa. from 1973 to 1978. The author held the positions of Supervisor then Superintendent of Recreation for the City of Reading from 1978 to 1987 resigning his later position to conduct his nine-month Around the World trip from Dec 1987 to Aug 1988. The author was also trained, certified and graduated from the 160-hour residential District Magistrate Program of the Minor Judiciary Education Board at Wilson College in Chambersburg Pennsylvania in 1982 and as a Pennsylvania Police Officer completing the 480-hour Reading Police Academy in 1983-4. He also completed a Para-Legal Certificate Program in 1976-77 at Penn State Berks Campus. Andrew J. Farrara currently operates an independent insurance agency in Reading since 1988 and spends his free time writing, observing, traveling, painting, and learning. In attempting to keep in shape intellectually and physically his personal motto has always been the well-known Chinese proverb: “Civilize the mind but make savage the body.” The author is presently working on an additional novel entitled Bonfire of the Gods about a group of world travelers taking a Grand Tour of Italia in 1896 starting in Rome Italy moving down to the mysterious Mezzogiorno of Napoli and Sicilia.