This is the humorous story of two talking cows, a shoe salesman and a religious cult that must band together to survive their misadventures in outer space.
Captain Bob and the Fortunate Forty are on a misguided journey to enlightenment. Their plan is simple and crazy. Their body parts will hurdle into space after they blow themselves up. In space their body parts will be picked up by an alien spaceship and reassembled by the friendly aliens who will guide them to the Cosmic Donut where they will merge with the Universe.
What is the Cosmic Donut? It's a vision that came out of Captain Bob's muddled head. Nothing goes as planned. Their bodies are indeed reassembled by aliens but the aliens aren't the friendly guides they were supposed to be. They want to use Captain Bob and his followers as lab experiments and then destroy them. Two talking cows and a shoe salesman also go along for the ride. The carefully planned journey to enlightenment turns into a chaotic fight for survival as the travelers are confronted by one peril after another.
Jimmy the shoe salesman and the talking cows turn out to be the sanest members of the group. They form an uneasy alliance that serves one purpose. Some how, some way, Jimmy and the cows are going to find a way to get back to earth.
Excerpt
There were stars in jars, a squardon of athletic shoes orbiting a neon green planet, cows playing scrabble on a park bench. Things were oozing in and out of view without any foundation in reality.
Jimmy opened his eyes. He was swinging in a cage like a Christmas ornament. The cage was hanging on a large metal tree. Looking around he saw Susan in a cage next to him and behind her were the cows each in their own cage.
"Swinging from a chain high in a tree. Oh what a glorious feeling to be swinging from a chain."
"Cowie want a cracker?"
The cows were awake and chattering back and forth to each other. They didn't seem to mind being locked up in a cage.
"Hey Bud. How about some cud?"
The tree they were hanging from was about thirty feet high and in the middle of a walled courtyard with a large adobe like building at one end of the courtyard. Looking down from his cage Jimmy figured that they were about ten feet from the ground.
"Well lock me up and throw away the key if I ain't in the air like some silly bee."
Jimmy tried the door to his cage and found to his surprise that it was unlocked. "Susan! Try your door."
