I’m permanently moving the chapters to Saturday for a number of reasons, including that Saturday is our day for promoting my readers’ books, and that will bring more attention to that post, if I have two posts that day. It also works best with my schedule. Friday will probably end up having an aggregator-with-commentary type post, but not today. Today you get a state of the writer thing, mostly because you guys have told me you like to know what I’ve done/accomplished/discovered in the epublishing front (and the others to.)
First, I’m ALMOST completely over the crud (but not quite.) This stupid thing really does have a long ramp up back to health. It took Dan almost 2 weeks. Granted he had the flu worse than I, but I had the secondary-infection bronchitis worse than he and what I found this week is that if I push it a little too much, it will knock me back a day, so I’m being very careful (I’m sure it is for the first time but you see, I REALLY want to finish books for Baen ASAP.)
So, that’s my goal for the next two/three months: finish Through Fire (which should be a matter of a week, though these things always take longer just in the final edit), then write Darkship Revenge which starts with:
We were out in space, away from all human habitation, and I was slightly pregnant. This wouldn’t be so bad if my husband hadn’t come from a world where babies are found under cabagge leaves. Okay, I Lie. They come from bio-engineered pouches called bio-wombs, which can be worn by either, both parents or paid surrogates. They only look like cabbage leaves.
And which is being very loud and worrying me because that opening doesn’t sound like space opera. Only, fortunately (?) the next second they find themselves in the middle of a battle, so that’s okay, right?
And then I must do Bowl of Red.
The problem with my having been sick since October (with maybe three weeks okay in between) is that the books that were waiting are all cued up and ready to go and they’re not taking no for an answer.
The thing is, while there are other potential issues — I must in the middle of all this find time to go see an endocrinologist because my vision has changed to way worse in six months (and no, it’s not diabetes, or at least doesn’t appear to be) — I’m convinced that most of the reason I’ve been sick for six months is that I have very low attention span. Or very low boredom threshold. Meaning when I’m well enough to get bored, the books are pushing, and I jump in with both feet. Which nine times out of ten means I either get sick again or, if I’ve impatiently fretted till I’m ALMOST well, just gets me stuck at that weakened level until the next infection comes along. Since my son volunteers at the hospital, that’s usually a week or so. And then each time I get a little worse.
This is due to “illusions of being made of titanium” as my older son says, or more likely to really bad habits acquired when I was twenty and DID bounce back from infections within less than a week and was fine. I guess having passed fifty things change. You know, these bodies need longer warranties. Just when you start hitting your stride, they start having issues.
Anyway, so I need to do those three for Baen ASAP. Witchfinder is in its last-last edit. The problem is the editor and I had some software issues, so half of his comments have gone missing. Since he uses comments for continuity issues… yeah. Dan is reading and marking it now. As soon as it’s done, I’ll send it to early payers, and then get it ready so it comes out print/ebook at the same time.
Meanwhile I have a LOOOOONG backlog of books that need covers/new covers and/or to go back up, so I’ve been working on covers while I was too sick to think in words. This is where the new Musketeer covers came from.
There will be others and I must somehow find time to put all the old stuff up. Mostly because it’s money I’m not making and if you think I’m so wealthy I don’t need it, you’ve been sorely misinformed about writers with two sons in college. I’m hoping to do that in the evenings, after I write during the day.
After I’m done with the three books that must go to Baen ASAP, there will be A Fatal Paws, the first Orphan Kittens mystery,
followed by A Well Inlaid Death.
And then we’ll see. I counted half-finished books and there are over twenty, so.
What I really need is a cloning machine.
Anyway, here are the musketeers resplendent in their new-cover-dom. The links below are to Amazon, but I’ve also put them up at B & N and Smashwords. I must do Kobo — maybe this evening? (I also have new covers for Shakespeare to upload and so on.)
This series will be continued as soon as I get all five initial ones up and finish the sixth. Sorry to be so late, but my health set everything back at least six months (and really more, since I’m still taking it easy.)
- Aramis’ Mistress is killed in a locked room. Only he could have done it. He didn’t do it. Mind you, it would suit a lot of people to have him hanged for it anyway. So he goes on the run, (worst of all, he has to stay with his mother, a terrible creature known as Maman!) and his friends have to clear his name.
According To Hoyt 
Maybe I missed it, but why not hire some domestic help? Your writing is your home business. If you deduct for home based business you should see if you could also deduct for cleaning/upkeep services for that as well. (I am not a tax-preparer however :p).
But seriously, if the writing is what brings in money, and getting Merry Maids or whoever helps your writing, do that. I did enjoy Darkship Thieves so I will check out Renegades at some point.
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Right now? Money.
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Incorporate yourself as a cleaning/domestic maintenance service and hire yourself to clean your home. Deduct your salary as a business expense:-).
Note: I have no idea whether this would be legal.
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I don’t either. I wonder if someone can tell me that?
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While I support aggressive claiming of all tax avoidance strategies, I think this falls within the “But your honor, she said she was 17!” perimeter. Meaning: if you cannot assert a defense in full expectation of not making the judge burst out in laughter you probably ought not try.
As a general rule, business expenses are only deductible against business income. I trust I do not need to lay out the logical problems of jabrwok’s scheme?
As an aside, for a writer anything which can be reasonably construed as research is
a deductible expensean expense deductible against your writing income. So yes, those memberships in the museums of natural history are deductible against your income from writing. This means that, until you reach JK Rowling or Richard Castle levels of book sales, most writers should be able to receive ALL royalties, incomes and remunerations from sales of their writing without paying a penny of tax on that income. It also means you best maintain meticulous records of such deductible expenses (think of them as shields against taxes) or be willing and able to aggressively deploy the Ditz Strategy in your defense.N.B., I am an accountant but not a tax accountant. The IRS not only changes the rules annually they interpret their rules haphazardly, therefore I disclaim any responsibility for anyone’s woes encountered as consequence of this comment.
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The problem is that we DO make enough to pay A LOT of taxes. Which is why I can’t afford cleaning, which would allow me to make more…
We already deduct museum memberships — of course.
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Do you deduct the blog, too? This really is amazing advertising.
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of course —
I don’t know if it is, but it keeps me sane-ish to know I have fans ;)
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A half-dozen folks in the last month have posted only to say they’d be buying your books, I’m not the only person who gives them as gifts, and Mary’s reading club is cross-fertilizing with folks who read a lot of other stuff.
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And for the next step, take out a sailboat, and make it go faster by mounting a big fan on it and blowing on the sail. (Don’t worry about how to power the fan…just use your perpetual motion machine.) :)
If you incorporate a business, you can deduct money that you pay yourself, from the income of the business. But then you have to pay tax on it as an individual. So you don’t actually win anything…you’re just blowing on your own sail.
(If the business is near-as-doesn’t-matter to 100% of your household income, and you can plausibly structure both your business and your life so as to put the business’s income and assets in a lower-tax jurisdiction than your physical body is, you can save some money. But it’s complicated to do that, in most people’s situations the legality would be dubious, and for a two-income household of which only one of those incomes could plausibly be sent through the corporation, it doesn’t really make any financial sense either.)
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Oh, DUH — yeah, thanks. I’m not QUITE awake enough.
Honestly, getting a cleaning something is on the list, but probably not until we downsize houses. This house right now, with trying to sell stuff and all, is not very well organized.
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Hmmmm … check with a local expert on this and the matter is probably moot because, IIRC, they have essentially eliminated capital gains on sale of primary residence throughout ones’s lifetime, but …
As a general rule, all expenses incurred to prepare and present a house for sale are deductible against the proceeds of that sale. This would include repainting, repairs, and arguably landscaping and cleaning services required to make sure the house is in optimally presentable condition at minimal disruption of your income-generating activities. So yes, a cleaning service should be deductible.
Again, that only matters if you expect to eventually have to pay capital gains on sale of primary residence.
I think you would be better off looking into the cost of a cleaning service in order to be able to maintain time for writing, as a shield against that income. If you maintain a separate office the cleaning of that office would be a deductible expense, nicht wahr? Of course, this does not make the cost go away, it is merely a means of shielding receipts through recognition of business expenses to reduce taxable income. Essentially this represents a discount on what the expense actually costs you, a discount that varies according to your tax bracket.
For a person in the 25% bracket this means the cost of ten dollars of such service is actually only $7.50, while for a Richard Castle in New York City with a presumed tax rate of 80% (combined federal, state, county, city and, for all I know, block taxes) that same $10 of cleaning would net out for two bucks after taxes.
Yes, there are implications here and I am sure I don’t need to explain them further.
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Nominations for April still ongoing:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1716253-april-2014-themes
Unless you’re all happy with Theodore Dalrymple’s work, which is fine by me.
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Well, I’ve ordered some Dover books and CDs, powered up Photoshop, and am looking to slap on some covers to short stories.
arrrgggh
(I will calm down in a bit, I hope.)
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You will. You will.
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I’m glad it’s someone else’s turn. I’m trying to sort out cover ideas for some short stories, along with writing the Novel-That-Was-Not-Meant-To-Be. Still a long way from trying to track down art and photos.
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TXRed — download a trial copy of filter forge. No, I don’t get money, but do. Look at the “creative” effects category.
Points — that cover of DOAM? The background is a photograph. The figure is from an 18th century painting.
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I’ll give it a try. At the moment I’m looking for good pictures of the remains of the library at Louven, for the short-story teaser about the alt-history WWI stuff. I’ve found a few, but none that really work for a cover without some serious trimming or tweaking.
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I’ve got a story for which a detail from this:
would be the perfect cover image if I could get a high-enough-quality image — that I can actually use commercially.
sigh
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Both of which are sticking points.
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I shudder to imagine what buying a commercial use right from the Hermitage might entail. Either phenomenally complicated with loads of paperwork, or “you want picture? Use picture” (babushka shrugs and shoos you off).
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Yeah, well, that’s the trick. Any other suitable coronation or royal portrait will do, but “suitable” is the trick. I want something where he’s dressed to the nines, doesn’t look half bad himself, and is not a king or emperor that people would instantly recognize. . . .
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Mary, have you looked in Artrenewal.com, dreamstime and morguefile? Remember, I have Filter Forge and I’ll gladly “paintify” a photo for you…
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Going to have to look more at artrenewal. . . its biggest downside is the lack of subject matter searching.
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yes, but the keywords can help.
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Raphael has been dead a LONG time. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/92/Raphael_Charlemagne.jpg
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So has Francesco Gardi http://artrenewal.com/pages/artwork.php?artworkid=24019
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And Francois Gerard http://artrenewal.com/pages/artwork.php?artworkid=23065
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*Shudder* Franz I always reminds me of Czar Putin, and vice versa. Not in policies (there are a few commonalities) but the look in their eyes and their outlook on life.
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Hmmm. . .that gives a clear view of his attire, but I’m not sure if the face would scare people off. . . perhaps I shall start to search for coronation portraits, for a clear view.
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This painter did an entire series on old Franz. There’s some when he was young…
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Cool. I’ll look
And I’ll play around with Photoshop to see if we can get “Sumptuous clothes” without the face. . .
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Dover and I are becoming friends, maybe they have a customer appreciation day. I hope.
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Dover closeouts/remainders sometimes show up at Edward R. Hamilton Books; I’ve purchased quite a few that way. (If you get damaged ones, let them know; they do seem to take quite seriously their satisfaction guarantee.)
If you don’t mind used Dover books, look on Better World Books. However, the CDs may be missing or damaged, edges banged up, etc. — but when I catch a sale that makes them $3 a copy (or less) , I tend not to be too picky.
Of course, there is always eBay, Amazon, and ABEbooks, too.
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Sweetie, you’ve been under the weather since just after Libertycon. I place full blame on your exposure to evil humours from She Who Shall Not Be Named on the panel from hell. Can I say hell or does Nameless own the rights to the word too? I expect she thinks she does.
Nice covers BTW. You should contract out in your copious spare time.
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Well, the entire upset that summer with some unnamed idiot deciding we were a “cabal” “attacking” her “reputation” (Like I could care less!) certainly didn’t help.
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Well, sure — the only reason her reputation could be suffering is because a bunch of meanies have it in for her. Her lack of talent, obnoxious personality and victimization complex couldn’t possibly have been contributing factors. She is a precious snowflake, too fragile for this harsh cruel world of resentful philistines.
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Cool, another Cabal I belong to …
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Cabals ‘r’ Us.
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We were wondering if she was having morning sickness . . .
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THP.
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Does that stand for something, or is it the sound effect of a carp slap? (Just want to know how fast I should run.)
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it was a raspberry. A warning that the carp is on the way.
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You’ve had enough of this carp?
(ducks, runs)
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DO NOT change that opening. If I’d never read you before, I would have been pulled in. And it sounds like space opera to me, battle or no battle.
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I second the motion.
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Sounds fine to me too.
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I’m hooked
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It’s really time for another DST fix. That’s a great opening.
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Keep this opening! It’s fabulous!
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Cool, the new covers sync’d to my Nook.
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:)
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G-d willing, the fourth will be re-issued next week.
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I have a cart waiting to be paid for at Smashwords. I’ll wait a week and so I can add the next Musketeers book.
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I really need to try the Musketters books some time– I’m really looking forward to the orphaned kitty mysteries, though!
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computer voice: “Working”
I’m finishing it in between bouts of space opera-ing. It’s so much less stress.
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I thought babies were only found under turnip leaves. You learn something new every day.
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My mom says I was left on the coal scuttle at the door…
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Probably left there by someone on their way home from a turnip patch who found one too many babies.
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Nods. Likely!
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Consistency is the important part of these … explanations.
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Around these parts, the zucchini fairy is a real thing (enthusiastic new gardener plants ten zucchini seeds, each one turns into Audrey II and generates a metric f*ckton of zucchinis, now frantic gardener is sick of zucchini and more are coming, neighbors stop answering door from fear of free zucchini, so they are “left” on the doorstep.) I can see someone meaning to leave zucchini and absentmindedly leaving the baby instead.
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This sounds suspiciously like the baby who was found in a handbag at the left-luggage at Victoria station, the Brighton Line.
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Surely, sir, you are not earnest?
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There’s a lot of importance in being Earnest.
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Hey, we’d take it and not tell a soul.
Okay, we’re nuts.
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For some time I thought babies came from a machine at the hospital like the ones that printed and developed X-rays, but without the vinegar smell. How this related to the pictures in the medical books remained vague at best. :)
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Mine told me I was the consolation prize in a turkey raffle….
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Mine own mother is certain I was brought forth by her, as she still holds the number of hours in labor against me.
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Ah. I lift three fingers to make Robert do what I want. Three days in labor!
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When they’re old enough to get it…
GUTTED! I was GUTTED for you, I say!
Do what’s asked or I go into detail of how it felt!
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Some places, they’re brought by storks, who just dump them on poor unsuspecting women who thus find themselves with six children and no father through no actions of their own.
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“but if they’re going to _deliver_ the baby, why do you have to go to the hospital?”
;)
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Y’know, I vaguely recall seeing documentaries about this happening. One was a Warner Brothers short film about a bunny rabbit delivered to an ape mother, IIRC. Another was a Disney nature film titled Lambert, the Sheepish Lion.
I am sure there were others, but it has been soooo long …
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There was also Dumbo. That may have had the same stork as in Lambert. Or maybe not. :-)
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http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Mr._Stork
He is.
I always got the impression that he was supposed to be known to people…
Oh, my.
Click on Sterling Price Holloway, Jr in the “voiced by” thing. An early example of “base the character off of the voice actor, ” apparently.
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Always loved Sterling Holloway’s voice. Though Jim Cummings does a good imitation of him.
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Well, I’ve ordered the three Musketeers books. Which even at Amazon repayment percentages means you can afford . . . maybe a sandwich? Or at least a bigger carp for particularly deserving cases.
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Thank you! This means she can afford to keep throwing carp at the inveterate punners, instead of having to throw the filleted carcass, or the guts, after she’s gotten what dinner she can from it first. :-)
It’s so much less messy to be hit with a whole carp!
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Yeah, getting hit by guts and stuff is just offal.
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Jeff, I just hope you’re proud of yourself.
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Always. And sometimes it’s even for a good reason.
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Not this time….
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That’s generally the case.
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You take that back! I do so too have a spine!
(walks off, mumbling, “call me an invertebrate, will ya?”)
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Only puny punters say “punners.” Everybody knows the term is punsters, with a hssst.
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If you’re REALLY good (or Bad), you earn the title of Punslinger.
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On the other hand, if you’re not very skilled, you’re just a punter.
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Of course you have a spine. Two. I’ve thrown at least two carp spines at you!
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Meh, skeletal systems are so overrated. *polishes his shell proudly*
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Keep polishing, I need some new grips for my 1911.
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Now now, you know what Gen. Patton said….
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“You name them; I’ll shoot them!” ?
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No no no …[about his pistol grips]
Patton: “They’re ivory. Only a pimp from a cheap New Orleans whorehouse would carry a pearl-handled pistol.”
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The general I am most fond of quoting is Grant: “!@#$*&?!”
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Well, you know what they say. “Dress your gun for the job you want, not the job you have.”
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Is this for your court gun our your Bar-B-Que gun? http://thelawdogfiles.blogspot.com/2006/03/court-guns-and-bbq-guns.html
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Now I want to put pearl grips on a polymer frame pistol.
And for those who have just been introduced to LawDog, you must read about his adventures with the honey badger and his work in the pink gorilla suit. Do not read the latter if you cannot be incapacitated for half an hour.
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Class Three Beverage Warnings are in effect for both of those stories. Do not read them if you are even in the same room as an open container of liquid. :D
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Alma …. I am in awe.
Although I can’t figure out if I qualify for pearl or ivory…
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TXRed – I’m giggling in the corner trying to stay out of the fallout. ;-)
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“The Squeaks Saga” was my introduction to the LawDog. I do my best to inflict his tales on other unsuspecting (but appreciative) souls. :)
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LawDog is Good People. And his Lady is awesome.
Although, the first I met him, we ended up running out of the house ahead of a dustalanche… (long story)
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I read that as installanche and was puzzled.
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I guess that means i need to move to New Orleans, then. :-)
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The only problem I have with that opening is that the description really doesn’t work with the term, “decanting” for the process of removing the infant from the bio-womb. “Decanting” gives one a sense of a mechanical device with a bulkhead-style hatch reminiscent of an autoclave (at least, to me, it does). I could work with it, though.
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Originally comes from Brave New World. Though I have heard people using it without the dystopian affect.
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I always think of pouring the wine so that the liquid and solid sediment are separated.
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Yep.
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Oooh…
A Well Inlaid Death…
That’s the latest Daring Finds (or, will be anyway)?
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Sure sounds like it…
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Yep.
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Cedar has corrected me. It’s supposed to be A Dovetailed Death. she named it, so she gets to be a quirky character in it.
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Which means I am afraid, now… very, very afraid!
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Maybe you’ll just be another adult that can actually take Scary Smart Child in stride!
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Breaking news: Russia has invaded the Ukraine. 13 Russian aircraft with 150 troops in each one at a Crimean air base. About the most controversial thing Sarah Palin said during the 2008 campaign was her prediction that Russia would invade the Ukraine if Obama was elected.
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Anyone else checking the calendar to see if this is 2014, 1968, or 1956?
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1938.
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1934… this is the ramp up.
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1934, Alas.
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They are controlling the two main airports. Troops landing in their big helicopters.
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Crimean war used to sound SO quaint. I went for a walk with my husband, while the world ended.
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It’s a good thing you guys didn’t elect some rabid warmonger, eh?
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Russia is Russia. *shrugs*
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What’s galling is that this is a slow-motion disaster that many people saw coming. Anyone with half a brain could see the Russians were going to attack after the Olympics. Alas, our leaders don’t even have half a brain between them.
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…or 1938, absent only a Chamberlain. “In order to protect ethnic Germans Russians, we have been forced to move military forces into the Sudetenland Crimea…”
Fox just played the snip from the 2012 the debate where Barry made fun of Mitt for saying the Russians were the main geopolitical rival to the United States. I guess the 80’s getting their foreign policy back wasn’t such a great idea.
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hm – my tags failed to agree with WP. Lets try a different way…
…or 1938, absent only a Chamberlain. “In order to protect ethnic
GermansRussians, we have been forced to move military forces into theSudetenlandCrimea…”Fox just played the snip from the 2012 debate where Barry made fun of Mitt for saying the Russians were the main geopolitical rival to the United States. I guess the 80’s getting their foreign policy back wasn’t such a great idea.
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It’s all just a little bit of history repeating . . .
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Don’t worry: this isn’t an invasion, according to the current administration. It’s an “uncontested arrival”.
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I think there might be something to that. You cannot sustain a major city by airlift (the Berlin Airlift wasn’t sustainable, and it benefited from the huge surplus in airlift we had from WWII). Russia doesn’t have any decent ports on the Black Sea (that’s why they’re so intent on Crimea) so sealift is out. The only roads to Crimea go through either Kiev or Melitopol. Russia hasn’t done anything to secure Melitopol like they have Sevastopol, despite the similar ethnic makeup, so it doesn’t look like they’re planning on staying for the long term. This could be Putin grabbing a couple of bargaining chips before sitting down at the table.
Or it could be a setup for a more general war.
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I fear the latter.
My favorite comment on Twitter: “Does an uncontested arrival lead to kinetic military action?”
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It’s just a man-caused disaster.
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Hugh Hewitt has several times interviewed retired United States Marine Corps Lt. Col. Frank Dowse, three years (1995 through 1998) the military attaché in Kiev, about the Ukrainian situation. I caught their discussion last night and learned that Crimea has historically been home to Tatars who were “relocated” by the Soviet Union so that Russians could be settled there. After the fall hundreds of thousands of Tatars returned to claim ancestral homeland. Advised that the Russians had lived there for generations the Tatars have unsympathetically noted they had lived in the Crimea for centuries.
Excerpts from 02-20-14 interview:
Once the Soviet Union disbanded, Ukraine became, by default, the fourth largest nuclear power in the world. A lot of people had a problem with that, including the Russians and the Americans. So they denuclearized, but with that came the continued control, economically, politically, diplomatically, of Ukraine by Russia. And this is historic going back centuries, from Catherine the Great, Ivan the Great, and then of course, the terrible issues that’s there that both determines coming through Ukraine, and the Soviets coming back. A lot of animosity there. Western Ukraine has built and incredible energy, it’s independence in getting out from underneath the thumb of big brother Russia. To the east, of course, you have much greater sympathy for Russia, because that’s more farmland, more industrial, and there are a lot of ethnic Russians living there.
[SNIP]
The issue with the Ukrainian…some people have asked me if this is going to be like Georgia. The Ukrainian military is a highly sophisticated, now they’re poor and they’ve got some challenges, no doubt about it, but they have fourth-generation T-90 tanks, and yes, in the eastern part with lots of Russian influence, many of the Russians and Uzbeks and Belarusians, when the Soviet Union fell, they resided in Ukraine. However, that’s been 25 plus years, almost 25 years now that we’ve seen this. So Ukrainian military forces are in fact, Ukrainian. And I will tell you something about the intelligence…
[SNIP]
there’s a number of different apparatuses, but in the end, you have what’s called the SBU, which is the successor to the old KGB, and then you have what’s called HUR or the GRU, which is the military successor to the GRU in Ukraine. Now the Ukrainian HUR is very, very pro-Ukrainian, pro-nationalist. And now what I mean by that is that they ahead and vetted and absolutely purged anybody who did not have Ukrainian grandparents on both sides, paternal and maternal, going back for generations, whereas the SBU is pretty much understood that they are pretty much infiltrated by Russian intelligence. And so what that means is that you’ve got, even within the intelligence community, you have these factions. Unlike the military, although they’re there, the intelligence factions, and that also includes an internal police, the MVD. They, too, are very pro-Rada, or pro-government, which you see manifesting itself with these horrific and jack-booted and extremely violent outcomes in the streets.
[SNIP]
[The Ukrainian people] are fed up. They’ve been fed up for years. This is really a culminating point to where there are not just hundreds of radicals, there are tens of thousands of inspired people that are simply not going to be the little brother to be patted on the head anymore.
[SNIP]
… the Ukrainians are not the Georgians. They have highly-sophisticated, fourth generation equipment both in the air, tanks and what not. It would be an unbelievably bloody and regional conflagration that would overtake the world stage in a matter of days if the Russians were stupid enough to try to infiltrate or to have overt military action in Ukraine. I would just say parenthetically that even with all this going on in Kiev, and throughout many of the larger cities across Ukraine, the real tinderbox, believe it or not, is actually the Crimean Peninsula. And I won’t go into all the details of why that is, but that’s the real hot spot. And so with those two things conflating right now, is it possible the Russians could be that stupid? Perhaps, but I can tell you one thing about the Russians when it comes to Ukraine. Ukraine is the prize. Ukraine is the hegemonic prize, and it would be absolutely shameful for Russian pride, history and tradition if the Ukrainians got out underneath them, and away from them.
[SNIP]
In Sevastopol, down at the tip of the Crimean Peninsula, there is the old Russian, the old Soviet Black Heat, which is the Russian Black Sea Fleet. And you also have the Ukrainian Navy that is down there. But they’re also huge tracts of Russian border patrol troops that are down there, coastal troops. And the Russians have a naval air facility in another place called Sochi, believe it or not. It’s the same name, which is right there in Crimea, in addition to all of the Ukrainian forces. And one of the reasons why I talk about Crimea and I’ve been writing a little bit about this as well is there’s the Marine Corps Tatars that have come back after the fall of the wall of the Soviet Union, which is fine. It’s traditionally Tatar land. And with that has come some messages of Islamic fundamentalism, and you know, great demographic and ethnic tensions that have been taking place. But Crimea is ethnically Russian, 90% ethnically Russian. So we could see something very provocative by the Russians to go into Crimea as a safety measure for its citizens, which could be a prelude to something much greater. And the Ukrainians would fight back, because that is strategic territory for them, and of course the Black Sea has one of the eight naval choke points in the world there in the Bosphorus. So it’s a very, very volatile, extremely tender situation.
http://www.hughhewitt.com/former-military-attache-kiev-frank-dowse-violence-independence-square/
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According to Wikipedia, the Ukrainian military – including reserves – is only ~1/3 the size of the Russian military – again, including reserves. It’s doubtful that Russia would mobilize their entire reserves, while the Ukraine almost certainly would. And my understanding is that traditionally the attacker wants to have at least 3-1 superiority over the defender. So if LTCOL Dowse is right that man-for-man the Ukrainians are near parity with the Russians, and the Ukrainian military and Melitopol stays loyal to Kiev, then Russia might not be able to pull off grabbing Crimea. Granted, those are some big ifs, but they might not be big enough for Putin to risk his European influence. He didn’t get to be Tsar by taking bad bets.
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The present problem in the Ukraine is that there is a revolution against the elected government. If one looks at the voting statistics from the last election. The country is divided evenly. 90-95 percent of the people in Eastern Ukraine voted for the present government, winning something like 52 percent of the vote. The East half considers itself Russian in culture and alignment. The western half thinks of itself as European and voted 90-95 percent for the opposition. If the country splits, hardly anyone has to move to the other side. The EU and the US are heavily involved in the west just as the Saudies and US were involved in Syria. The US has put up a Missile Shield around Russia and wants to remove the buffer- Ukraine. Naturally Russia wants protection from Europe and will work to protect the government that aligns itself with it. In away, its a repeat of the Georgia battles we were part of a few years ago and McClain wanted us to go in on Georgia’s invasion against those nasty Russians. Personally, I hope we stay out of it. Let the EU do its own fighting.
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I don’t think there is any question about the US going in — nor do I think the Ukrainians would want us to. There is a great deal that can be done short of military intervention* but it is unlikely the current regime will do any of it.
*Financial aid to stabilize the Ukraine’s new government and finance new elections, military supplies, fuel and equipment, possibly some military observers/advisers (is Col. Kratman free to go?) Serious sanctions on Russia might be useful in conveying a message that they can’t count on Obama, Biden & Kerry to continue compliantly handing over their lunch money like they have with regard to Syria and Iran’s nuclear build-up. (Except, of course, they know they can and know our guys will not only blink, they’ll close their eyes to avoid seeing what is going on.)
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Taking Crimea by force, even if it’s possible (and I agree it all depends on how the country splits, if it stays unified against Moscow I think they have a good chance of hanging on to Crimea) would be incredibly dangerous to Putin. It would almost certainly trigger a mutual defense pact between Poland, Belarus, the Baltics, whatever remained of an independent Ukraine, and anyone else who spend any time under Russian or Soviet domination. You’d also see a crash, probably joint, nuclear weapons program since the Western promises that led to the denuclearization of the satellite states have been proven to be worthless.
So Putin would have Crimea and secure access to the Black Sea, but he’d also have a new, pissed off and highly motivated, version of NATO right on his border. That doesn’t sound like a great trade.
Of course it would completely discredit Democrat foreign policy for decades, so there’s a silver lining.
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From an Andrew Stuttaford post at National Review Online gangblog The Corner, offered “for what it’s worth”:
Over at In Moscow’s Shadows, Mark Galeotti tries to deconstruct Putin’s game plan:
So what does Galeotti think happens now?
That sounds convincing to me. Galeotti slips in the caveat that his views are based on the assumption that Putin is acting rationally, but makes it clear that he believes that the Russian president is doing just that. I’d agree.
Events, however, have a momentum of their own. …
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/372316/clausewitz-and-crimea-andrew-stuttaford
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If the three Musketeer Mysteries have a time dependence (later ones refer to earlier actions) it would be helpful if the cover said “A Musketeer Mystery” and “The Second Musketeer Mystery”, and so on until you’ve sued up all the numbers.
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Oh. I did put them in the description — however, the continuity is slight. Like most cozies, they’re episodic.
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I bought the first Musketeer Mystery way back, but read it during the winter which means I don’t remember much of anything. I’ll probably buy the others once I have reread the first one. How do your timelines fit in with the Dumas stories?
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Let’s put it this way. The beginning of one of Sarah’s chapters is a brief description of The Three Musketeers. I spent an embarrassingly long period of time grumpily wondering why she had glossed over what sounded like a ripping good story.
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We are beginning The White Company by Arthur Conan Doyle
No spoiler discussion here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1722408-march-2014—-historical-fiction—-the-white-company—-no-spoilers
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Spoilers here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1722409-march-2014—-historical-fiction—-the-white-company—-spoilers-allowe
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