The Tragedy of Orenthal, Prince of Brentwood
By Michael Monk
Five-Act Play/Humor/Tragedy
Hardcover/6”x9”/b&w/156 pages/2014/for sale online
ISBN 978-1937650360/$20.00/available at Amazon and BarnesandNoble
Softcover/6”x9”/b&w/156 pages/2014/for sale online
ISBN 978-1937650377/$10.00/available at Amazon and BarnesandNoble
Not since Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth, and Lear has there been a tragic hero so worthy of playwright and pen. Enter Orenthal James Simpson, O.J. to fan and foe alike, blessed with good looks and charisma, cursed with capacious jealousy and rapacious rage. His victims—ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman—suffer gruesome deaths that go unavenged, while the audience watches in rapt disbelief. Playwright Michael Monk tells the O.J. Simpson tale as it might have occurred and as it was meant to be told—in iambic pentameter blank verse, in five acts, with stage direction and a prologue; that is, in the manner of Shakespearean tragedy, with lively, engaging style punctuated with humor.
The Tragedy of Orenthal received a gold medal as one of eight selected Outstanding Books of the Year from the Independent Publisher (IPPY) Book Awards and additionally placed as a category finalist in the 2014 Eric Hoffer Book Awards.