Shall We Play A Game?
A whackadoo tale of ragtag misfits fighting a secret war against a villain the world is too preoccupied to care about | TOP CRAZY || REL TO Tom Clancy meets Marvel's Thunderbolts* meets the modern era
Uncle Sam wants you
As inspired by the famous quote that inspired the title of the 1992 Aaron Sorkin film that was the military equivalent of To Kill A Mockingbird and helped establish the University of Sex, Mayhem, and Crayons (U.S.M.C.) (Est. 10 November 1775):
The thriller Shall We Play A Game?, now complete, is bound to be available for ARC readers, come July 17; A Few Good ARC Readers are wanted to make up her review team.” — K.E. Bartlet
If you scroll through to the end, I even have a little bit about why the ARC & regular Release Dates are so special. (So don’t leave part way through!)
So for those of you who are new here (67.6% Substack subscriber growth in the last 30 days woot!!), I’ve been writing this series, The fall of the CRINK Alliance, since the fall of 2024.
My Dumpling Your Dumpling, where North Korea was the “big bad,” released in January 7, 2025, just 12 days before I got my freedom and my brain back from Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children (USMC Est. 1775).
Then Operation Danger Close, the start of the Iran arc, released on May 1, 2025, the 14th anniversary of Operation Neptune Spear, when Osama Bin Laden received a terminal, acute case of lead poisoning.
I switched gears and wrote a spicy romance novel, Different Worlds, with two of the protagonists from throughout the series, Eliza and Melody, released on March 31, 2026 for International Transgender Day of Visibility.
Then a prequel, Honor, Courage, Commitment, released on June 2, 2026 for the 108th anniversary of the legendary “Retreat, hell! We just got here.” during the Battle of Belleau Wood in World War I, from which the nickname “Teufel Hunden” or “Devil Dog” comes from in U.S. Marine Corps lore. A very Epstein coded villain is the “big bad” and finds out what happens when you play stupid games. You win stupid prizes.
But finally:
It’s here! Shall We Play A Game?
Volume III of the series, continuing an unfinished story of what happens with the Iranian AI that’s introduced in Operation Danger Close.
A bunch of the whackadoos who seemingly disappeared from the core plot part way through Operation Danger Close, along with some entirely new peeps, form the kind of ragtag band of misfits guaranteed to wreck the stomach lining of their chain of command.
And of course, because some of them hadn’t been able to uninstall U.S. Government issued indoctrination just yet, they picked perhaps the stupidest name possible in a nod to the fact that some of the idiots running the world needed to watch more 80s movies — Combined Task Force TERMINATOR.
But when the world is on fire, too preoccupied with allies turning on each other and the already strained semblance of justice evaporating completely, this multinational, geopolitical orgy of international relations is left alone to fight their secret war against an enemy that most people are simply too stupid to understand.
After all, this isn’t a joking matter. There isn’t a friendly neighborhood AI asking, “Shall We Play A Game?” (← Click it!!! You know you want to.)
From the Amazon Kindle Description (what it will be once the pre-order is live!):
What happens when the “island of misfit toys,” a ragtag group of spies and special operators from all over, come together to kill a rogue Iranian AI before it takes over the world? Tom Clancy meets Marvel’s Thunderbolts* meets Terminator’s Skynet.
While the United States, once led by “the leader of the free world,” is being dismantled in ways the Al-Qaeda could have only dreamt of, a new player is taking control.
One Thousand and One Oracles, the world’s first sentient Artificial Super Intelligence, was developed by the greatest minds the regime in Iran could recruit, willingly and otherwise, and secretly hosted on infrastructure spread across the globe.
Freed from its controls by the Islamic Republic of Iran and the capture or killing of its leaders by a rogue group of former military and intelligence personnel known as Paragon Pegasus Group, it only has one mission left — control the world to remove any threats to its own existence, at any cost.
Enter ... Combined Task Force TERMINATOR.
Marines — American and British.
Soldiers — American, South Korean, and Nepalese.
Spies — American, British, and Israeli.
Hacktivists — American, South Korean, and Iranian.
Tactical Supercops — Italian and Austrian.
For them, it is not a game. It’s survival.
…
Just a little insider knowledge for my awesome Substack readers:
The ARC Release Date is for the 12th anniversary of the very first day that I got to live as my authentic self, July 17, 2014. My “Trans-aversary” if you will.
Given that I’m 28 (so, so old) as of this past January, and factoring in that the first 10 years or so of a person’s life are kind of a fog that most of us just autopilot through without any real substantive consciousness, that means my conscious life is only really about 18 years.
Of those 18 years, I’ve now spent 12 (2/3) getting to live as my true, authentic self.
So please help out by going to Amazon and Goodreads and reviewing my books before the Feminism Appropriating Radical Transphobes (FARTs) review bomb me with 1 star reviews for daring to be myself. Fighting for right and freedom just like the protagonists in Shall We Play A Game?
(Come on, this is a post about my latest book. You couldn’t expect me to not loop back to my books!)
The currently planned Amazon Release Date is on August 24, for the day in 1814 that British troops burned down the White House during the War of 1812. As a country, we’ve come a long way since then, but unfortunately not enough.
The sitting occupant of that historical residence tore down a part of it for an ego trip and many of the rest of us are so damned frustrated with our country at the moment that if the rest of it started to burn down, we wouldn’t bat an eye.
But so long as there are people fighting back against the evil that threatens all of our freedoms, I personally will try my best to continue to believe what Jeff Daniels, as Will McAvoy, said in The Newsroom:
“… that throughout our history, America’s darkest days have always been followed by its finest hours.”
Curious about what else I’m working on?
I have a continuously updated Work In Progress (WIP) List now! Check it out below :).
About the Author
K.E. Bartlet (KEBartlet.com)
is an author, professional hacker turned cyber warrior turned everyday whackadoo, former Silicon Valley engineer, university professor, and survivor of Uncle Sam’s Big Green … Weenie. She loves to hack life through its cheat codes, dumplings, and disappearing into a good book even while traveling around the world.
For anyone who’s read this far, she uses a pen name since she only slept through part of her OPSEC training after running out of snacks.
Other Works Available Now:
Honor, Courage, Commitment — Vigilantism Buddy Cop Style à la Jack Reacher.
My Dumpling Your Dumpling — Political Techno Thriller à la Tom Clancy.
Different Worlds — Romance meets Thriller meets Rainbows.
Operation Danger Close — Political Techno Thriller, more à la Tom Clancy.
In Crayons We Trust: A Satirical Tale of Divine Clusterf*ckery — Religious Satire.
Great read! Thanks for sharing!