If you have ever wanted to conquer the world, this book is for you: “Conquer the Planet: A Modern Day Global Enslavement Handbook,” by Sir Lawrence McAlister (445 pages, Ingsoc Publishing, 2025; hardcover, $34.95; paperback, $24.95; ebook, $9.95).

Sir Lawrence McAlister gives you a detailed plan, with many examples and footnoted resources.

As he writes in the first sentence of Chapter 1: “To conquer the planet, a well thought-out world view is crucial.”

The book’s publisher Gene Duffy has different goals for the book than the mysterious McAlister does: “McAlister is writing for the wolves. I want to release it for the sheep.”

McAlister is the pen name of Duffy.

Very few people will have the resources or connections to put such a conquest into action. The book posits that the rest of us are dominated by propaganda and psychological techniques behind official narratives of world events.

“People don’t get the full story. Information is power. We don’t have a say in our own fate,” says Duffy in a phone interview from his home in Jim Thorpe.

“McAlister is a blue-blood elitist who treats people like peasants, while helping to decide the fate of humanity. He is privy to information most people don’t have,” Duffy continues.

“Technology is working at such a fast pace that humans cannot keep up. The great advances are the same things that enslave us.”

Duffy mentions that a data center for AI is proposed to be built in the vicinity of his house.

“It could use five million gallons of fresh water a day and will cause a lot of pollution,” he claims.

“There are plans to use AI to replace humans, working toward a trans-human future. Peter Thiel says that human beings are hackable,” says Duffy.

In the novel, McAlister writes about creating peasant farms, not agricultural but corporate.

“Corporations are run by people behind the scenes,” says Duffy.

From McAlister’s viewpoint, scientific advances that improve our lives can be used for other purposes:

“Originally, the methods of enslaving one’s fellow man were blatantly obvious ... As the tactics were refined over many centuries, they became perfected to such a degree that most peasants today are completely unaware of their bondage and quite content in their servitude.”

Crises such as war can also be useful for control, according to Duffy, quoting former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who said, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste.”

Adds Duffy, “You can create the problem so people will be begging for the solution.”

Duffy is not registered as a member of a particular political party. He says that much of what people hear works to turn people against each other:

“It stops critical thinking. It’s just nonsense. I prefer that each side just bludgeon themselves to death.”

Or as McAlister writes: “Conflict within the system will keep your peasants engaged … do not let your peasants unite!”

Some of the book’s footnoted references are by controversial historians, which seems to place “Conquest the Planet” in the realm of conspiracy theories books.

Duffy says that fear of questioning such theories keeps people in their belief system. “Eventually, we will run out of conspiracy theories because they all came true,” he says.

Duffy moved to Jim Thorpe when he was six-years-old. He attended Jim Thorpe High School and The Pennsylvania State University.

He says he lived in Los Angeles for 10 years, running his own entertainment production company.

He says that “the corruption” he saw in Hollywood paralleled some of what is described in “Conquer the Planet.”

Duffy says he played football for the Fresno Bandits, a minor league semi-pro Pacific Football League team active in the late 1980s to early 1990s, and the Arizona Rattlers, a professional indoor football team based in Glendale Ariz., and came close to being signed by an NFL team.

With Sara Viteri, he wrote and directed “As the Matzo Ball Turns: The Musical,” based on the novel by Jozef Rothstein (also Duffy’s pen name). The show, which included actors from the Lehigh Valley, was presented in Jim Thorpe and at the 2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival.

“Literary Scene” is a column about authors, books and publishing. To request coverage, email: Paul Willistein, Focus editor, pwillistein@tnonline.com