Wimbledon, Kentucky

By H. Claire Taylor

Who needs a hero when there's a scapegoat?

Laurel Sapphire’s dinner parties have never been a huge hit. But that all changes when her guests discover that it never warmed up after winter ... and it’s now the middle of August. 

As word spreads from Wimbledon, Kentucky, to the rest of the world, which is also downright chilly, so does total panic, and suddenly Laurel's hometown finds itself at the epicenter of a global crisis.

After a multinational summit of heads of state decides to pass the buck along, saving the world falls to the good people of Wimbledon. 

With no other option, Laurel Sapphire plans yet another dinner party—this one assembling the greatest minds of Wimbledon into her cramped and poorly decorated dining room in hope of discovering a solution to the global cooling crisis. 

Do the best and brightest of rural America have what it takes to save the world from ... moderate discomfort? 

Wimbledon, Kentucky is a sharp, playful satire and the lightweight weekend read you've been craving. Fans of H. Claire Taylor will not be disappointed by this delightful comedy.

Buy Wimbledon, Kentucky to start laughing your ass off instantly.

• Language: English
• Publisher: H. Claire Taylor
• Release date: Mar 8, 2016
• ISBN: 9781519990693

Book preview

Chapter One

It hadn’t yet warmed up in Kentucky, which was odd. It was August .

It had always warmed up before, but not this time. In fact, the whole earth was downright chilly. The children lost interest in snowballs, snowmen, and sledding, and people only grew paler and paler. Many scientists, with their backs against the wall, eventually blamed global warming, clinging tightly to their theory and creating new theories to nurse the dying one back to health. Inevitably, the cold, pale people decided they hated scientists.

Humble little Wimbledon, Kentucky, never thought it’d be known for anything special, mostly because there was nothing special about it. It wasn’t even slightly interesting. The most interesting thing that had happened in years was the mysterious yawning epidemic of ’92, which had started when Jeffrey Hamford told a small group of townsfolk about his hogs’ new habit of rolling in the mud before they ate, then eating for a while until almost all the slop was gone, then rolling in the mud once more before going back to check the trough for remnants and how very unusual that was for a set of hogs to take a break from rolling in the mud to check for remnants…

The yawns caught from person to person, as yawns tend to, until the whole town was in on it, shooting yawns back and forth around Main Street like a pinball machine. It carried on for days, and no one really noticed when it stopped.

But Wimbledon was now the place where people first realized that there’d been no summer, and after they’d realized it, they all felt a bit silly for taking so long to figure it out.

The people of Wimbledon told the people of Hopshire, the next town over, and though the Hopshirites claimed they’d already figured it out way before the Wimbledonians, they hadn’t. They just didn’t want to feel silly by admitting that those damn Wimbledonians had caught on to it before they had.

All of Hopshire shared the same trepidation when they heard the news. They agreed at the town hall meeting, where they frequently came to resolutions about the feelings of the town as a whole, that hearing the news felt like finding out you’d been stalked for the past six months without knowing who was doing it or why it was being done.

When the news spread south, all the Texans felt rather embarrassed; they should have been the first to miss the warm weather. When the news spread west, the Californians rejoiced in thinking how much this might help the polar bear population.

Once the Internet had become saturated enough with the news that the major networks began reporting on it, the federal government became aware of the situation, and the White House issued a statement that claimed it’d seen this coming for months and blamed it on Americans for being fiscally irresponsible. When Americans protested, the White House recanted its statement, instead issuing an official Statement of Resentment to the Chinese for preventing warm weather, to which the Chinese responded, We were just about to do the same thing to you! Secretly, the Chinese wondered why they hadn’t missed summer before the Americans had mentioned it, and the Chinese government began mass-producing propaganda claiming that it was because of the increasing body heat produced by overpopulation. It quickly passed legislation for a full restriction on childbirth.

One of the Wimbledonians had a cousin living in Australia who he called to tell about the missed summer. The cousin was alarmed and decided to get the word out. She started with all the media outlets, but all she got was an Oy! It’s still wintah heeah, mate!

The Europeans said it was probably because of the poverty in Africa—oh no, they weren’t blaming Africa; they made that clear with the multi-artist benefit concert. They were blaming Americans for being so stingy. Had America taxed its citizens more, it could have spent more on African aid, and things would have warmed up, saving the hardworking pop artists the trouble of adding philanthropy to their already exhausting schedules.

The North Africans had noticed the lack of warm weather as soon as the cold had set in. It wasn’t supposed to be cold where they lived. Ever. They’d been politely mentioning it to the Europeans since the first snow, but the Europeans dismissed it as tribal superstition and increased their financial aid toward North African educational facilities.

The Scandinavians heard about it last of all, and they just laughed. Misery loves company.

Then Russia blamed America, and America blamed China again, and China blamed Tibet, and Tibet shrugged it off. But Israel blamed Palestine, and Palestine blamed Great Britain, and Great Britain blamed France, and France blamed America, and America blamed Russia, and Russia blamed Germany, and Germany wondered if maybe everyone was right to blame them, but then decided to blame Iran instead. Iran blamed Iraq, and Iraq blamed the Western World, but just when the Western World was debating whether to blame Iraq, Afghanistan, or Islam, they had an idea. Surely this idea would be much more productive than throwing around the blame.

It was Canada, of all places, that came up with the idea and called for a convention of world leaders in Montreal. The sequestered leaders spent three cold weeks behind closed doors until an agreement was reached that Canada was a bad place to hold an international summit during a prolonged winter. It was another two weeks before they came to a decision about the climate change, and that decision was to be announced internationally at 7:00 p.m., Mountain time. That meant 9:00 p.m. Wimbledon time.

The Wimbledonians had developed great pride in the fact that they had been the first to draw attention to this international crisis. Never mind that the Hopshirites had managed to take credit for it for almost three full weeks before the truth came out that the epicenter of the discovery actually lay in Wimbledon. The Hopshirites had been suspiciously absent from commenting on their lie as of late, though. In fact, they’d been suspiciously absent from most everything since the day when the folks who lived in the heart of Wimbledon had seen all those military vehicles cruising west towards Hopshire.

But once the truth was cleared up, Wimbledon was finally able to claim its proper celebrity status. The city council had passed a law that required all televisions to be turned on and set to a twenty-four-hour news station at all times to follow the hoopla. And finally, after weeks of international cooperation and deliberation, there was an announcement to be made at 9:00 p.m., Wimbledon time.

Many families, like the Sapphires, had even scheduled viewing parties. The leaders of the world were going to bring back summer, and to celebrate, the Sapphire family made a nice summery spread of hot dogs and piña coladas. Everyone was already tipsy and bloated by the time the press conference began, and they remembered why hot dogs and piña coladas weren’t supposed to be eaten when it was cold outside and you were just sitting around inside.

All the chairs of the Sapphire house had been gathered into the living room to accommodate the large turnout. Everyone in town had wanted an invite to the Sapphires’ event since it was during one of their dinner party conversations that the terrible lack of summer was first noticed. The Sapphires had become local celebrities since that had happened, and their house was now the place to be in town, their dinner invitations some of the most coveted in all of Kentucky. Everyone wanted to be at the next dinner party, in case lightning struck twice and another great discovery surfaced during polite conversation.

Laurel Sapphire sat on the couch, chatting with Melanie Johnston, who bounced her small baby on her lap.

Weeks? Laurel asks. You really haven’t heard from anyone in the Hopshire school district in that long?

Melanie nodded gravely. We just can’t get in touch with anyone over there. You know, I ran into Jack Knowles the other day, and he said he’d tried to rally some support from Hopshire for—oh, I can’t even remember what he was protesting—but when he drove toward their Main Street, there was nothing but barricades and mean-looking men in camo.

Maybe there was just a flash flood up ahead that they were keeping people away from. Maybe they were just some hunters in their gear. But Laurel didn’t buy her own story. Georgina, who worked at the salon with Laurel, had heard similar stories whispered lately, and didn’t hesitate to perpetuate the dissemination of information to anyone who would listen. All the stories pointed to one thing: no one in Hopshire had been heard from in weeks.

Turn it up! barked Bill Sapphire at his wife. Laurel jerked away from her conversation with Melanie, fumbled with the remote control, found the volume button, and cranked it up so loud that the Johnstons’ little baby started to cry. Cooper Johnston shot his wife a look so mean that she jumped up from her seat next to Laurel and ran from the room, carrying the crying baby with her; she’d just have to miss the announcement.

On the TV, the White House press secretary approached the podium.

Camera flashes lit up his face as he adjusted the mic. He cleared his throat and gave the country what it was waiting for.

After much deliberation, the great nations of the world have reached a milestone decision. This is the first decision in this history of the world that has been unanimously agreed upon by all countries involved…

Laurel Sapphire held her breath. She couldn’t believe she’d been partly responsible for raising awareness to the only issue that all the leaders of the world could agree upon. She’d never thought such a thing was possible, but apparently, it was, and that buoyed her faith in humanity.

"…We’d like to think we know what is and isn’t within the control of mankind, and it has been agreed upon that this situation is a direct effect of human carelessness. But which humans? This is a simpler question to answer than it seems. It has been resolved by