A campus. A van. Ten o’clock. One blast that changes everything.
On August 22, 1970, a powerful explosion rips through Treviso Hall at Oswego College—an attack staged to protest the military’s grip on American campuses. The shockwave claims lives and fractures futures: Terrance Howard, a Black security guard and Vietnam veteran, rushes students to safety in a final act of courage; Jeremy Shebson, a young attorney, is hurled into a marble statue and awakens a paraplegic; and Olivia Dunne, a gifted math student, discovers the “textbook project” she was recruited to support has been weaponized—her calculations used to guide deadly operations overseas.
As investigators sort through wreckage and rumor, questions mount. Who plotted the bombing—and why did a stolen van packed with fertilizer sit behind Treviso Hall? How deep does the conspiracy reach into the quiet corridors of academia? And when truth implicates friends and lovers, what does justice look like?
From Chicago’s housing projects and ER wards to campus sit‑ins and SDS back rooms, the trail stretches north to a Wisconsin Northwoods cabin near Stevens Point, where idealism, fear, and loyalty collide. In the long aftermath, Terrance’s heroism, Jeremy’s fight to rebuild, and Olivia’s battle with conscience drive a story that refuses easy answers—blurring the line between protest and terror, righteousness and revenge.
Larry Kaplan’s A Ticket to Oswego is a propulsive, era‑immersive thriller about the price of taking a stand and the hidden machinery of power.
