If you’re reading this, chances are you’re human.  (Unless you’re a minotaur, of course. This blog doesn’t discriminate on your percentage of human DNA. Like the owner could throw stones and all.)

Yesterday a friend asked a question, which has apparently been rocking right wing blogs and talk shows: “Is considering humans as inherently good a right or left thing?” I’d managed to miss it completely until a friend brought it up.

At which point, I rolled my eyes so hard they went under the sofa. And let me tell you that with Havey having now claimed me as his person (in his half -daft way.  I don’t know what instructions Greebo left him, but running over me, screaming starting at six am is NOT the way to get me up and writing.) those eyes were COVERED in fuzz.

Because the answer is “Yes, but it’s complicated.”

Sure, the left believes in the essential “innocence” of humans.  What it actually means is that, back there, at the beginning, they believe humans were born perfect and corrupted by society.  (Who has the time machine to go strangle J-J. Rousseau with his swaddling clothes, again?)

And the modern left believes a more elaborate lie, in which we are all born PERFECT and things like madness and crime only come in because of capitalism.  They have this entire Christian-heretical story according to which we lived once in a hunter gatherer paradise, where there was no private property and everyone had equal rights.

Then, the evil of greed and private property entered the world, and corrupted humans, so that men started exploiting women, people wanted to have “things” and everything went bad evil.

They base this, MOSTLY on their misinterpretation of primitive cultures and the remains of our most distant ancestors.  As in “Listen,paperskull, just because people didn’t have a ton of stuff, it doesn’t mean they didn’t cherish what they had.”  In fact, in some of the more primitive-living tribes, private property in the sense of un-needed and chance-come-by property, like charms or statues or whatever are very privately held and dearly loved.

This is why we find trade goods hundreds and sometimes thousands of miles away, in the graves of some of our ancestors.  IF you think that was some communally held property, you have more rocks in your head than the average progressive idiot.

In fact, some of the other great apes will fight over things they consider theirs. And if you’re going to say that’s because they were corrupted, you might want to consider that the only life for that won’t defend what is theirs is probably an ameba. And maybe not even then.  We just don’t know much about them.

Again poverty doesn’t mean “everything held in common.”  Yes,more primitive tribes have systems for sharing property and things you make. They are, arguably, responsible for some of the difficulty these tribes have crawling out of poverty, as they enable a system of crab bucket, where those who can’t or won’t do cannibalize the work and ingenuity of those that do.  In that sense, it is indeed primitive communism. But I wouldn’t brag about it.

At the same time, the left has this vision of humans as they are now as “no one is good and no one is clean.”  No, I don’t know how they reconcile it in their heads. I have a strong suspicion that they don’t reconcile anything in their heads, just receive it all, like open-mouthed guppies and don’t even chew as they swallow.  But let’s be charitable, maybe they think that capitalism — that all powerful idea you can own things and trade them… Wow, mind blown — has corrupted humans so far, that now all humans are tainted and evil.

This has some echo in their idea they can “fix”humans with “progressive” “education” (aka indoctrination) and various jiggerings of the way people live, trade and communicate.

So, they believe that humans are all evil, and everyone commits “crimes” and “evil” particularly those who get ahead/create anything/ are successful.  I.e. “no one gets ahead without breaking the law.”  I don’t know if they ever say that explicitly, but it’s obvious and implicit in all their art, writing and story telling.

But they also believe humans are INFINITELY perfectible by “education” — by which they mean making humans think and behave in a certain way.

This is solidly within the Marxist dream, where, after the dictatorship of the proletariat perfects us, the state will “wither away.”

Do I need to tell you they’re wrong?

The left believes they can write scripts for humans and humans will follow them blindly.  This can lead to a suspicion that leftists not only aren’t humans but have never met a single human.  I think it is more likely though that they are incredibly privileged humans of an intellectual bend. They grew up in stories, more than in the real world, and therefore believe the just-so story of Marxism.

And no amount of failure of their Procrustes bed of socialism/communism will convince them they were wrong.

So, do they believe humans are naturally good?  No, they believe humans were once naturally good, before evil-bad capitalism (think of it as a serpent) taught them to be bad, and now the only thing to do is “teach” (bully, arrest, cancel, beat) humans into perfection.  And hey, if most of them have to die along the way, is that too much to pay to bring paradise to Earth once again?

So, what about conservatives, (and for the purposes of this we’ll include Libertarians. What do they believe?) Do we believe that humans are naturally good?

Define good. Define human for that matter. And while we’re at it, let’s define everything else.  Okay, you don’t have time for that, so …. let’s table it for now, but remember it.

Most conservative/libertarians believe that most humans are as decent as they’re allowed to be.  Note “decent” not “good” which gets us into “whose idea of good.”

I.e. most humans can be trusted to look after their self interest best.

Wait, doesn’t that mean most humans will break the law and be criminals if you let them?

Well, no. The point is that in most cases the route to what humans want — which is some individual combination of status, family and stability — is easier if you don’t break the law.  In a sane society — say the one the founders intended (yeah, I know, now shut up) — breaking the law is the more expensive way to achieve that point.

And most humans, btw, do not want or aspire to unlimited power.  Yes, there are some. But most of us don’t.

Most of us, hell, don’t aspire to unlimited money or fame or whatever, either.

We (and by we I mean me and my friends. I don’t know about you tovarish) believe that humans are fundamentally self-interested, and have limits on all their impulses, from greed for money for greed for power.

This is obvious if you look around.  Go and look up your friends from childhood, for instance, and you’ll find yeah, some of them had a lot more potential, but weren’t willing to do the work. Some could have great families, but couldn’t be arsed, etc etc etc. But in the end, most people reach the level they are willing to pay for with sweat and tears (and occasionally blood.)

If they wanted more, they would work for it.

It is only when a system becomes fundamentally broken, like totalitarian societies, and progressives try to force a way of living — down to the least minute detail — on everyone, that humans become “naturally criminal.”

In fact, I think this idea that everyone is naturally evil-bad is the left’s long sustained scream at the fact that humans refuse to follow their scripts, and the tighter their script gets, the more we deviate.

The right? We believe if you leave people alone and impose only the minimal rules to make sure people with a raging thirst for power aren’t stomping on everyone else, and enforce them consistently, people are more or less decent. They mind their own business, and work and accumulate wealth to the level they wish, and then stop where they’re not willing to work any harder.

Now, we also believe all humans are fundamentally broken in some way, because, well, we’re in many ways jumped up social apes (I’m leaving out what I believe about the soul’s aspirations, because that’s based on stuff that is by nature unprovable) which means we have the impulses of social apes.  And those guys aren’t some kind of primitive and natural saint. All the sins of humanity are pre-figured in the physical form we inhabit, from murder to rape, from cannibalism to violence.  And so, those of us who aren’t extreme Libertarians know that most people are decent, but not everyone is some kind of noble savage or saint.  So, police is a necessary evil, to make the price of going off the rails expensive enough that just killing the neighbor and taking their stuff isn’t the lazy man’s way to riches.

In the same way, because nations are no more saintly than individuals, and because individual cultures tend to have their own agendas (whether the cultures are national or multi-national or tribal)we need a government, not just to regulate the administration of law, and prevent the police from going insane, but also to negotiate with other cultures/tribes/national and supra national entities.

Because government is essentially force, it’s very important to keep it out of the hands of those who believe humans are infinitely perfectible if ONLY government takes over every aspect of life, including how many squares of toilet paper you’re allowed to use for what purpose.

Because there is no faster way to turn everyone essentially evil than to make it impossible for them to subsist without taking things and hurting people.

So, the left believes we’re all meant to be noble savages. And is willing to commit all sorts of evil and violence to make us that again.

The right believes all of us have impulses and desires that are uh…. not noble at all savagery.  But the way to live in a functional society and prosper as a whole is to keep those under control.  Making it too socially expensive to hurt people and take their stuff can help make society on the whole, happy healthy and wise.

Yes, some individuals will fall through the cracks. That can’t be helped. You can’t make everyone happy and wealthy and contented.  Not without giving the savages in government so much power that all nobility, kindness and essential goodness is driven off and we’re all screaming apes, locked in a social hell.

So, yeah, depending on how you define it, (I told you we’d go back to definitions)  you can say either the left or the right believe in the essential goodness of humans.

But as usual, the devil — and the saving grace — are in the details.

 

 

Book Promo

*Note these are books sent to us by readers/frequenters of this blog.  Our bringing them to your attention does not imply that we’ve read them and/or endorse them, unless we specifically say so.  As with all such purchases, we recommend you download a sample and make sure it’s to your taste.  If you wish to send us books for next week’s promo, please email to bookpimping at outlook dot com. If you feel a need to re-promo the same book do so no more than once every six months (unless you’re me or my relative. Deal.) One book per author per week. Amazon links only. Oh, yeah, by clicking through and buying (anything, actually) through one of the links below, you will at no cost to you be giving a portion of your purchase to support ATH through our associates number. I ALSO WISH TO REMIND OUR READERS THAT IF THEY WANT TO TIP THE BLOGGER WITHOUT SPENDING EXTRA MONEY, CLICKING TO AMAZON THROUGH ONE OF THE BOOK LINKS ON THE RIGHT, WILL GIVE US SOME AMOUNT OF MONEY FOR PURCHASES MADE IN THE NEXT 24HOURS, OR UNTIL YOU CLICK ANOTHER ASSOCIATE’S LINK. PLEASE CONSIDER CLICKING THROUGH ONE OF THOSE LINKS BEFORE SEARCHING FOR THAT SHED, BIG SCREEN TV, GAMING COMPUTER OR CONSERVATORY YOU WISH TO BUY. That helps defray my time cost of about 2 hours a day on the blog, time probably better spent on fiction. ;)*

FROM MACKEY CHANDLER: APRIL.

ON SALE FOR 99C THIS WEEK!

April is an exceptional young lady and something of a snoop. After a chance encounter with a spy, she finds herself involved with political intrigues that stretch her abilities. There is a terrible danger she, and her friends and family, will lose the only home she has ever known, and be forced to live on the slum ball Earth below. It’s more than an almost fourteen year old should have to deal with. Fortunately she has a lot of smart friends and allies. It’s a good thing because things get very rough and dicey. They challenge the political status quo, and with a small population the only advantage they have in war is a thin technological edge.
The entire “April” series is building towards a merge with the future series that starts with “Family Law”.

FROM PAM UPHOFF:  Warrior At Large (Wine of the Gods Book 52.

Ice is back, and back in trouble! Fired from the Directorate, he’s working three part time jobs, and tripping over problems that a Warrior of the One can’t ignore. Spies from other Worlds and corrupt politicians is just the start

And with no one ordering him around, he’s free to deal with problems his way.

FROM MARY CATELLI:  The Witch-Child and the Scarlet Fleet.

Trapped in a pirate port. . . Caught between pirates who would force him to use wizardry in their aid, and a king who would force him to spy, Alik will need every scrap of wits and wizardry to forge his own path.

WRITING CHALLENGE

*No word for the challenge.

Write the opening two paragraphs of a story OR a two paragraph novel blurb based on THIS picture. SAH*

I’m going to try to do a chapter of Witch’s daughter later, but I need to go deal with the floor varnishing first, and probably lunch.
For those that watched the Prometheus award, I’m sorry my camera crapped out (zoom suddenly decided I didn’t want it, and it took me forever to find THAT setting.)

Crawling around on the floor looking for USB hookups (some are behind the computer) made me lose track of what I was saying.  Hopefully it wasn’t too bad.

Wiggles fingers.  See you later.
Anyone want to listen to a reading of work in progress later on? I can do a zoom meeting, though I don’t know how many people it will allow….

Yes, I DO know who also painted walls: Anyone too poor to pay a painter.

Though right now our biggest problem is even getting estimates for ANYTHING.  Apparently all the Americans who still have jobs are doing home improvement.  Which makes sense, if you have to work from home.

I just waited in a line of 10 to get paint mixed at Home Despot Depot.

Kate Paulk helped talk me out of a dead end in plotting yesterday.

Also oh, yeah, tomorrow I’ll be presenting one of the Prometheus award at NasFic and after will be on a panel. F. Paul Wilson will also be there.

Also, if Overgrownhobbit reads this, can you resend the post.  I can’t remember your real name, so I can’t find it. (sigh.)

I think that’s it.
Sorry for more or less skipping out on you, but I want to be done with home stuff so I can write.

First of all thank you.  I do feel somewhat better. Though honestly, I think part of it is this formless void of a semi-shutdown and social isolation routine.

As I said before, I’m an hermit. Mostly I live under a rock, writing novels. But–

But I used to go out, sometimes on a whim, to say the grocery store or Goodwill or the craft store because I was under the control of a Bright IdeaTM.  I no longer do that. I really can’t wear masks. This is not just because I think — on an informed opinion from reading a lot of things, including the reason they’re not recommended during wild fires in CO, like the season five years ago that destroyed my health for four years — they’re ineffective and counter-productive. It’s because I’m a mostly controlled asthmatic. As in, I can go for months without needing the rescue inhaler.  If I get an upper respiratory virus, or if we’re having a bad fire season, I’ll need it maybe once a day.  OTOH if I wear a mask, the re-breathing of my own exhaled air, plus the high humidity will have me using a rescue inhaler several times a day.  To be clear, that’s say 2 hours of wearing the mask for a doctor’s appointment results in days of needing the rescue inhaler all the time for a week or so.

It has other issues.  My oxygen saturation is marginal at best, one of the reasons we’re considering going low altitude in a few years, so I don’t need to wear oxygen all the time as I age.  But that’s something else.

Anyway, the on a whim “I’m not a prisoner in the house” trips to the store or the post office are not a thing anymore.  I have and use visors.  Weirdly restaurants are fine with this.  But with stores I never know when they’ll call the manager in a panic to stop me. Seems to be on a whim.  To make things worse — maybe that’s just my feeling — it seems to me everyone at the store is radiating fear and anger.  So if I go out — and I have to do it at least once a week — I tend to wait till I’ve run out of almost everything, and then I go at odd hours, and rush through the store, like I’m on a scavenger hunt.

Even walking in the neighborhood — thanks to Paste Eating Polis wanting us to wear masks everywhere outside the house — is fraught. No, most of my neighbors aren’t stupid. Most of them aren’t masked, either.  There was an incident with a lost puppy yesterday and we were all gathering to figure out whose she was with not a mask in sight.  So, the neighborhood in terms of my street is sane.  But outside my street….  while walking with younger son we met a woman walking her dog, with her two adorable kids running alongside.  As I usually do, I prepared to pet the dog.  And then she looked at us — yes, she and the poor children were wearing masks. I’m surprised the dog wasn’t. I mean, a papaya tested positive after all, which tells you everything you need to know about the tests — and scrambled away from us in a panic, to about 10 feet distance, while snarling at us.  One encounter like that is enough to make me hesitate to walk for a week.

And then there was our “fun.”

Look, I’m an incredibly dorky person — yes, I know, you already knew I’m a writer — and even when we were young, cute, and had the money, neither of us ever had much interest in “the glamorous life.”  Okay, part of this is our insistence in living within our means as much as possible and having no credit card debt. But still. We probably could have managed a couple of glamorous trips or at least semi-glamorous ones to the seaside. But out kids were “treated” to vacations in Denver, randomly because I had a search on when Embassy Suites had a sale. And it was Embassy Suites because we could have the kids in a separate room but only pay for one, and also because if we got up late enough (never a problem with kids. Though since we didn’t own a television at the time, they usually got up at around six am to watch cartoons, however getting them away from the cartoons took forever anyway) we could let the kids have an epic breakfast, which meant we skipped lunch and only had to pay for a meal a day.  And during the day? Well, we did such daring stuff like hit the zoo and museums (memberships are good value) or go to Lakeside, the cheapest amusement park in Denver.

THAT was our big, expensive fun.  Oh, we also, sometimes, took free tours of factories, or went for drives.  Oh, and we looked for books in used bookstores (I remember spending two such weekends in pursuit of comic bookstores with bargain bins. We made younger son VERY happy.)

Again, as I said, that was when we had more money and were young and cute.  Now? Well, we used to have dreams of shopping for cheap airfares and going to random cities for weekends of writing (or researching. It’s always good to have locations in your tool box) and meeting fans.  That — sigh — might never be possible again.

BUT we had settled in a very nice pattern.  I hate cleaning.  Actually, no. I get bored cleaning.  That can be solved with Great Courses and Audible.  It’s still a lot of work, particularly as, having lived here 4 years, we’re still organizing, so cleaning comprises a lot of other stuff.

To reward myself for cleaning, whenever I cleaned the house (usually Fridays) we’d take the next day (or more usually half a day) and do fun stuff, like go to a lecture or exhibit, or the botanic gardens or the zoo, and usually out to eat.

This was not only time out of the house, when I could see people and assure my back brain that we were not outcasts on an ice floe and that depression wasn’t called for, but time we weren’t interrupted by cats or calls, and didn’t feel we needed to be doing anything else.  I talked plots, he discussed his plans for music. That sort of thing.

Then there was church.

Anyway when we first locked down I thought “Whatever, I can not do this for two weeks. not the end of the world.”  It’s far more than two weeks.  Because Polis is dumber than most rocks, (or perhaps because he enjoys his stupid and pointless power) even the zoo and the botanic gardens, OUTSIDE, IN THE SUN require face diapers.  Also, you have to book a week or so in advance, and frankly, we’re never that organized (Sometimes my cleaning is on Saturdays, and Dan’s jobs can have emergencies.)  As for church, we’re allowed 10 people no matter how big the church, and again you have to book way in advance.

So I lost my reward system, but I also lost my anchor points.  Sometimes — I did tell you I was dorky, right? — if I was having a bad week, I focused on that date afternoon with Dan and planned what I was going to wear, where we’d go, etc.

All that is gone.

To make things worse it’s been a year of repeated punches in the gut, a couple completely unexpected.  And after a while, it gets to you, and you have no anchor.

Anyway, all this long explanation for why I hit a wall yesterday, and why it was hard to even think of writing.

And yes, it sounds like I’m whining about not being able to do fun things.  I am. Whining is better than growling, which is what I feel like doing.  Dorky though my rhythm of life was, it was mine, and I LIKED it.  Yes, I’d be quiet about it if it were a necessity or if were doing anyone any good, and not simply part of a tactic to stoke fear, destroy the economy, and enable Paste Eating Polis to pose in front of his mirror in his Hugo Boss uniform.  The pointlessness of it all, and telling me I should be willing to do it because my betters say is what causes the growl.

Yes, I need to figure out ways around that sense of utter isolation, ways that my backbrain understands. Turns out, for instance, having Kate Paulk on Skype, even if we only exchange a sentence or two a day helps a lot.  I don’t know why. I’m planning other things. More on that in a moment.

The rest of the state of the writer isn’t all bad.  I’m finally writing again, but it keeps getting interrupted by house remodeling.  We now have two rooms left to floor, and after that a major cleaning and culling of the garage and the storage room needs to happen.

After which I can get storage crap out of my library and be able to access my research books.  And also, maybe, use it as a broadcast room.

You see, our library is in the basement, so we can completely control the lighting.  And once the storage crap is out of it, we can put in an armchair, and I don’t care if you guys see the books I have on the shelves. (Yes, some of them are weird.)

Because of the stupid hits this year has given us, I’m thinking — for short term money — of teaching writing workshops.  Younger son says he can record them and perhaps edit the videos. However, he can’t edit the sound, because of his sensory issues, so we’re trying to find someone to do that (Though it’s kind of academic until we clean the library which will probably take a month or so.)  I will then offer lectures, but also will do “homework” correcting (i.e. reading people’s efforts and critique) probably once a month. I will confess this is half for the money, but half for human contact. Because of that, probably one workshop a month and unless I love them unreasonably, probably only for four or five months. Because I want to be a writer, not a teacher.

I’m also thinking of doing readings and meetings with fans via skype and/or zoom from my office. Probably evenings, maybe Saturdays?

Money-wise, I am finally collating a series of posts from this blog.  In fact, I have and have printed them to edit.  These are about acculturation and immigration, and will probably be called Coming to America.  I want to do on on America itself (“My country ’tis of thee”) but that’s harder to do word searches for, so it will take longer.

These will be published under A2Hoyt, so as not to confuse fans of my fiction.  Yes, I’ll announce them here when they’re done. Yes, there will be a paper edition.

I confess I have no clue what to expect from this, because honestly though a lot of people say they’d like it, it sounds like when people say “publish your books on paper, and I’ll buy them” and then you sell 2.  We will see.  I have roughly 8 years of daily posts, and even after editing out the passing commentary or the complaints about health and other stuff, it’s a lot of wordage that can be mined.  Again, we will see.

The money is not a systemic problem, btw, it’s the fact that our car broke down when we least expected it, our other car was in a stupid accident (Yeah, the car not the driver, as the driver was hemmed in, and had to go over something that damaged the undercarriage.) and stuff like that. Like basement shower will need to be replaced, because it was improperly installed. Etc. Also we’d like to recover from the hit taken for the boys’ education. And cats were stupidly expensive this year, which I wouldn’t mind except it ended in death in both cases.  The recovery part is not STRICTLY necessary, but well….  If we can, I’d like to do it.

Anyway, so that’s where things are.  I’ve had for some time now, also a plan of doing short (10 to 15 minutes) how to write videos for youtube.  Honestly, I don’t even know if anyone would be interested, and am even more doubtful on whether it would translate to book sales (Writers don’t buy your fiction just because you give them free teaching, which is why MGC has changed format.)

Then when I was going over posts to collate, I came across this:  Not Dead But Laughing.

I thought it would be great fun to do these as videos, with cartoons/ funny images.  Basically the narrated version of a GIF post.
The obvious problem is finding material to fisk.  While a lot of you are teachers, it would be bad to use your students’ stuff.  And while many “ridiculous essays and tests” circulate, most of those are fake, or not worth joking about.

I don’t think there’s a solution or a reliable source, but what the heck, I thought I’d throw it out there, because some of you might know of some.  Heck, some of you might know of the papers of a few professors (punch up when you can) that are on line and which are on that level of idiocy (I know of one.)

Anyway, it’s worth asking. I can then do a series of videos to amuse you.  And maybe it will cheer you up too.

Meanwhile, I’m feeling better.  Sorry for scaring you, but sometimes — very occasionally — I’m human and I have trouble even finding my bootstraps, much less pulling myself up.

And now, I’m going to finish flooring the room in progress.  After which I have to be in a zoom meeting for the Baen Corsairs anthology (which has the first/introductions to Robert’s and my Star Student universe.  Hopefully I’ll make it, as there is an appointment in between flooring and that, and if there’s traffic, I might not.)  And then I need to get paint and repaint the just-floored room because (wouldn’t you know it?) I got the touch up paint in the wrong brilliance. GRRR.)

After which, at 5 pm or so, I need to write.

But I am feeling somewhat better, and I’ll continue putting one foot — and one word — in front of another.

 

 

 

There was something grandma said when you said “My heart is broken.”

“Make your guts into a new heart, and go on.”

Humans are …. complex. We’re not precisely one thing or the other.  For instance, even when I wrote eight hours a day, every day, I wrote in the wave of my inspiration. You see, I had trained inspiration to come on cue.  (And because I usually wrote on Saturdays, if we went on vacation, I still got the inspiration on Saturdays, which is why I have to ton of stuff to type in scribbled on multiple hotel note pads, napkins, paper towels and toilet paper.

But when it all breaks: when I’m sick and tired and despairing, I can write from rational thought, and, once or twice out of pure malice and spite (hint, malice and spite don’t make for my best books. BUT they do get them done.)

I’ve been accused many times — accused being the right term — on this blog of being an optimist.

I’m not.  I’m actually a dark, despairing pessimist, which feeds wonderfully into my depressive tendencies.

Because I don’t want to die — or worse, live in utter despair and destroy the lives of those around me with the gloomy cloud of despair — I’ve spent most of my life since I was fourteen or so doing what I call “reality checking.”

“It’s not that bad/can’t get that bad, because look, there’s this.  And this won’t work the way it does in your brain. And–”

When you get all those posts you say have cheered you up, or where people come to yell at me for being an optimist they are the result of a dark night of the soul.  I trolled the depths, and from the depths I brought THIS.

This is why I tend to avoid, like the plague, both horror stories and the sort of despairing thriller where you fight and fight and fight and in the end it’s maybe slightly better, but not much. Or you become what you have fought.  That is the NORMAL pattern my mind tries to make. i had to train myself out of it.

So I’m very very good at seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and determining it’s not an oncoming train.

And guys, I’m having trouble. Real trouble.

I look at “70% of the country” including places like Texas and Utah will be voting by mail.  And I know what happens with fraud by mail. And early fraud, and all the various corruptions of “voting” that are not on the day, after you registered a month earlier, at a verified address (you know, the sort of thing they make you do to get a checking account, say?) and on paper, and then carefully watched.  All of those, btw, are run by the same people now demanding vote by mail, to save them from a (granted particularly severe) variation of the cold virus. Which mostly kills people over 80 who are already in poor health. (To be fair, just about anything kills them.)

And I don’t see how we turn this.

And everything the left is doing, in their spiraling insanity seems to confirm it.  Kamala? Biden? That necrotic convention? The idiot rumors about Trump (possibly personally) stealing mailboxes? All of it adds up to “We’re just making it credible enough that Biden wins. We have the votes taken care of. It’s in the bag. Like the communist countries of old, we don’t even have to run a credible show.”

And I can’t do anything.  I’ve tried.  G-d knows I tried. Years ago — 2012? — when I first talked about how all those “conveniences” in voting increased fraud, I got ON THIS BLOG a barrage of “You just hate me and don’t want me to vote because I have to work.” Or “I love voting by mail. It’s so convenient.”  And of course, the usual idiots said I was against the military voting, apparently failing to see the difference between unavoidable, carefully watched situations, and just mailing out ballots to every person, cat, dog and imaginary character at an address.  I tried to point out because of motor voter a lot of permanent residents THINK they can (and should) vote. Because no one explains you have to be a citizen. Or insist on registering you even if you show as ID, say, a Japanese passport as has happened.

Now no one is saying any of that when I mention fraud by mail and early fraud. But now it’s too late. Most states have same-day registration. The early vote tells the left how many new voters to register, even if their names are Mickey Mouse and Milk Jug.

And because crooked election after crooked election was accepted, so long as the left does a little dance and pretends they have massive support, and the press sings along in the choir, well….  How do you dispute one? Will anyone even dispute one? Even try to? Or will the right be afraid of the mythical “uprising of the people” if they do?

I don’t know if it’s the circumstances of this horrible year, but I feel myself future blind.  I usually have a sense of what’s coming assembled by my (despite myself) rational processes beneath the surface.

I don’t now.

I don’t see past the beginning of November. If the left wins, the country as we know it will be gone within a year.  And if you think that’s impossible contemplate what they’ve done to our cities and states in five months. FIVE MONTHS.

They want to open borders wide and confiscate and redistribute property.  After that, there is no America.  And like with NYC (which I always loved, despite everything) there is no coming back from that. The people themselves will be broken.  Why create, start, work really hard, dream, do anything, when it can all be taken away at a whim?  The East Germans haven’t recovered. Russia… well, Russia is Russia.  But America, put through that won’t be America. Whatever emerges on the other side will be just a country of serfs. In my dark hours I think we’re halfway there.

And don’t tell me we can rebel and fight. Guys, we can’t go to the store without masks.  The left revived their monopoly on information in the shutdown. By trying to get information on the plague, they are glued to the TV night and day, and even though it’s lies and frankly outright nonsense, people are being gaslit into believing them.  Which is why the panic fear of the unmasked person, and the mob that forms at grocery stores to form an asthmatic to mask up. Even though masks — if they do anything — are a net negative, and the virus is nowhere near as lethal as advertised.

We’re back to where we were in the seventies and eighties, where if the right commits any violence (even violent words) they are the aggressors, and evil bad, and must be destroyed. Look at the whole “your words are violence.” Hell, even our silence is violence. Even their violence is our violence. Look at what they did to JFK’s assassination. That’s what they’ll do to any (real) resistance.

Grandma said to make your guts into a new heart and I’ve been trying.  It’s not working markedly well.

I’ve started feeling all those symptoms of stress that I used to have when I knew the publisher was doing his/her best to bury my books, no matter what I did, and that I couldn’t fight back.

It ties in with all the symptoms of stress from my growing up years, where I also could do nothing.

I need to make my guts into a new heart. I need to–  Well, at the very least I need not to worry my family. Getting flooring done and books written would also help.

But I think I went through my guts last time I had to forge a new heart. I have nothing.  And though I see that what they’re destroying is mostly their own fields, and though I know they can’t keep their insane regime forever, I’m afraid they can do it long enough to destroy us.

The loss of wealth, health and ultimately life these past five months, not from Covid-19 but from the stupid attempts to destroy us, disguised as attempts to stop the virus, is incalculable. It might be more than all the wars of the twentieth century, worldwide.

And the loss of American spirit is far, far worse than that.

I want to believe we come back. I want to believe we recover. I want to believe this insane clown posse of grifters and corruptocrats (anyone notice this started JUST as the whole Russiagate was about to be nailed to Obama’s tail? Or that everyone running this crazy psiops on the virus has their pockets filled by China?) will be gone after this last final spasm.

But I’m holding on by my fingernails, while I look at the election approaching and a massive Game Over blinks in my head.

I need you for a reality check. I need you to be the optimists for me.

My guts are worn out. May I borrow yours?

*Re-reading this I am both struck by how we’re getting the same thing with Covid-19 and masks as we did with climate six years ago, and also by how the message in this is more urgent than ever. – SAH 2020*

The Future Must Belong to Those Who Question – a blast from the past from September 25, 2014

And even those who mock, joke and deride, particularly those who do so to an almost-universally held faith in their region/time/place.   People must be free to hold dissenting opinions without risking death.

Why do I say that?

There was that climate march in NYC and people tried, by means of slogans and shouting to insist that we must all change the way we live; that we must go back to a way of life that would necessitate the demise of 80% of human population, in order to… stop the planet warming up.

This despite the fact that we have no idea how much the planet is really warming up or why (corrupt data, corrupt data-keeping, corrupt… everything – the result of science done to government specifications.), the fact that most of the world couldn’t care less what these marchers do and say and that the ecological disaster that is China will offset any sacrifices we attempt to make, and the fact that the celebrity marchers all produce enough carbon in a month to offset any reductions I could make in my lifestyle over a lifetime, even if I went to the loony point of living as we did in the village where I grew up: a lightbulb per room and early hours to bed; no labor saving devices; a radio as the only electrical form of entertainment, etc.

Let’s leave that aside for a moment though, and concentrate on the truly appalling spectacle of Robert Kennedy Jr. demanding that those who don’t agree with him about what is causing the climate problems (?) be put in jail or killed.

The United States government, Kennedy lamented in an interview with Climate Depot, is not permitted by law to “punish” or to imprison those who disagree with him — and this, he proposed, is a problem of existential proportions. Were he to have his way, Kennedy admitted, he would cheer the prosecution of a host of “treasonous” figures — among them a number of unspecified “politicians”; those bêtes noires of the global Left, Kansas’s own Koch Brothers; “the oil industry and the Republican echo chamber”; and, for good measure, anybody else whose estimation of the threat posed by fossil fuels has provoked them into “selling out the public trust.” Those who contend that global warming “does not exist,” Kennedy claimed, are guilty of “a criminal offense — and they ought to be serving time for it.”

Let’s suppose that everything Mr. Kennedy thinks about the climate is true. Why would he want to silence anyone who disagrees with him?

If everything he says is true, surely he has proof. More importantly, surely he has ways to explain/get around the fact that without modern technology 80% of the people in the world would die, due to problems of transportation and growing enough food in enough places. Surely he has ways to convince China. I mean, if his science is that iron clad, they wouldn’t want to die any more than we do? Surely he has ways to convince all the rest of the world, which has nothing to do with the (Libertarian, and for all I know AGW supporting,) Koch brothers or the Republicans.

Unless he thinks the rest of the world hangs suspended from those peoples’ lips? And even a trust-fund-baby celebrity can’t be that stupid.

In other words, if he’s really concerned about AGW, he should be talking to the rest of the world, particularly the emerging nations, not just the US public. To pretend otherwise is a cop out, and a dishonest one.

Instead, the power he wants is the power to kill or imprison – to silence – anyone he disagrees with.

Note that people like me, who think that proponents of AGW demonstrate they don’t believe in it with their lives, don’t wish to stop them talking. On the contrary. The more they parade and berate, and show their allegiance to communist causes, the less credible they are. We want them to keep talking.

This extends all across the pet causes of the left. Feminism? Oh, please, do keep talking about how you want to kill all but 10% of males.

The lack of women and minorities in science fiction? Do keep talking. We have books going back to the fricking fifties that give you the lie and you just expose your crass ignorance.

The War on Women, in the group with the most pampered, indulged women in the world? Please, even some of the kids no longer buy it.

White privilege, which is screamed in the faces of Hispanic and even Black males who disagree with the narrative? Please, oh, insane mind, speak thyself.

However, from their side all we hear is that they want us to shut up and (in sff where they’re soft) “hurry up and die.”  Or in the rest of the world “be killed.”

Whence this recoil from opposing opinions, this desire to shut us up?

I have joked in the past that militant Islam with its demands that anyone who says anything about the prophet should be killed betrays a fundamental insecurity. Those of us who truly believe G-d exists don’t believe He needs US to defend His honor.

We figure if He’s really upset, He’ll take care of it in his own good time.

But this effect of having to defend something so much bigger than you that if you’re sure it exists, surely it doesn’t need YOUR efforts to defend it, seems to be an effect of theocracies, where people of not very strong beliefs are afraid of hearing opinions/ideas that contradict what they must believe in to remain in the fold and in the good with the society around them.

Hence, medieval Christianity and most of Islam today.

Hence, the left.

The progressive project that, in various forms, consumed most of the twentieth century, ran out of ideological justification with the fall of the Soviet Union and the transformation of China into… something more approaching Nazi Germany than the Communist Project.

This has taken the certainty from under the followers of the left. The smarter ones, surely, know their ideology is rubbish and there isn’t a working example of a top-down socialist/communist society in the world that is self-sustaining, let alone competes with the US in innovation and creation at any level.

Even the not so smart ones have to have an inkling. They can no longer point to the USSR and tell us if only we knew its wonders we’d convert.

Their leaders are old, their ideas are depleted. They, in the parlance of my kids generation “got nothing.”

So instead of real belief they have the desperate clutching at the appearance of belief and conformity, the appearance of being right.

They’ve done so much for the cause, most of these celebrities and ideologues, that to backtrack now would be unthinkable. They’d have to face themselves in the morning and realize that they supported causes and movements that killed a hundred million people worldwide and held far more in abject squalor.

They can’t do that. Courage was never their strong suit, otherwise they wouldn’t have gone along with the crowd after the fall of the USSR.

So they just want us to “shut up already” and “die” so that in their totalitarian version of reality no little voice shall mar their self image.

They are like MacBeth, trying to silence his conscience. They are in fact

“in blood

Stepped in so far that, should I wade no more,

Returning were as tedious as go o’er.

Strange things I have in head, that will to hand,

Which must be acted ere they may be scanned.”

And our only hope is to keep speaking, to keep making them scan their strange things in head before they come to hand.

Because the other way is unthinkable.

Obama once said (after arresting a film maker for making a movie about Islam, which did not after all spark the murder of our ambassador) that the future must not belong to those who insult Islam.

On the contrary, Mr. President. Insofar as “insult” is questioning and pointing out contradictions and, yes, even joking, the future MUST belong to those who insult Islam, to those who insult Christianity, to those rare souls that bother insulting Hinduism and the other more exotic beliefs, and even to those who insult the Marxist religion of the left yay and verily, even its Global Warming branch.

That is because any belief, religious, scientific, economic, ANY BELIEF that would claim the allegiance of the whole of humanity must be tested and tested and tested. It must be able to withstand jokes and knocks and above all argument.

Remember at one time Aztec human sacrifice and Nazism commanded a large group of believers. This didn’t make them right.

It’s only hypocrites and cowards who demand the silence of others, afraid their own weakness be exposed and they’ll be forced to look at themselves in a true mirror and recoil in fear and error at what they see there.

If you think that saying “All Lives Matter” somehow diminishes the fact that black lives matter, you might have a chunk of Marx in your eye.  You might also be a stone cold racist.

Look, the way a Marxist explained it (I got it second hand) is that if you tell someone that your kid is having a really sh*tty time in school, and they say “all the kids are having a sh*tty time” you are somehow diminishing that parent’s experience.

Sure you are. IF the kid is having a particularly sh*tty time, in fact. For instance, when younger son was going through hell with no galoshes, if someone had said “all kids have a terrible time in that school” I’d have said “uh, not all, but you’re right, the school resembles a prison camp, and when I went to have lunch with him, I was appalled.”

I wouldn’t have said “you’re disrespecting my kid for saying that.”

And if in fact, the facts on the particular thing you were complaining about (say, you claim your kid is getting an extraordinary number of detentions) turns out to be not only false but also crazy cakes (no, statistically unarmed black people DO NOT get shot/killed more than unarmed white people, not even proportionately to their numbers in the population. Not that you’ll find that without looking very carefully at this point.) not only am I not disrespecting your kid, I’m telling you to loosen up the tinfoil hat.

I’m sure that Marxist — I don’t talk to him, because frankly 2020 is enough of a problem — would come back citing rates of single parenthood, rates of failing in school and statistics of employment.

And yeah, you can say that black people in America have a really rough deal in those respects. But — and this is very important — do they have a rough deal because no one gives a d*mn or because they’ve been the state’s particular pet project since the Great Society?  Because you know what? I’ve never seen the government actually do something to improve the lot of Americans or in fact anything outside its allotted duties in the constitution that doesn’t in fact result in the exact opposite of what they say it will. Examples? Oh, hell. Radio Free America is a source of anti-American propaganda. The department of education has resulted in generations of uneducated, barely literate children.  The department of energy seems hell bent on making sure that energy supply is irregular, fragile and expensive. The government’s space program, after a burst of some achievement now seems mostly devoted to keeping Americans out of space, at least Americans in their own bodies.  And–  Why go on?

In fact anything beyond protecting the borders (wouldn’t it be a great idea if they actually did THAT) and enforcing the law equally (Wouldn’t THAT be another great idea?) seems to be beyond the reach of the government. Mostly because government is force and it’s at its best when breaking things.

Yes, I know the racists of both sides (Joe Biden “Poor kids are as smart as white kids” Head desk.) will come and say that black people couldn’t achieve or find their way in society without help. I not only find that argument nauseating, I find it bitterly funny.

To the idiots who think that black people are genetically inferior I say that the diet in the poor parts of Africa influences IQ and that the culture distorts the whole thing further, and besides IQ doesn’t mean what you think it means.  Or as a friend who works in the field put it “We don’t know what IQ means, but it doesn’t mean what people think.”

Oh, you mean black people in America?  Yeah. genetically speaking, unless we’re talking about the children of very recent immigrants, the technical term for black people who are American is “Caucasian.”

As someone who was once not culturally American and who has acculturated, let me tell you that the way Americans identify races makes me think of the farside cartoon with the two penguins on the doors of the bathrooms and “only they can tell the difference.”

Not only could the Reverend Wright and Kamala Harris disappear into the general population in Portugal and not even be thought anything but white (not that Kamala Harris pings anyone’s radar as ‘African” or at least I hope not) but it would have shocked me 34 years ago if you told me I looked or could be identified as anything but white. However I recently found a 20 year old picture of myself (I’ll probably be using it for the Jane Austen fanfic pen name’s author page, once I figure out where Dan put the scanner after the office move.)  I’d never thought of myself as anything but white, even then, though people tend to identify me as Latin.  But I was wearing a perm at the time, and the picture is black and white.  And looking at it, I realized, if I saw it now, and didn’t know it was me, I’d assume it was a young black woman.  (Oh, I DO have black ancestry, according to 23 and me, though frankly the total changes back and forth. Probably enough I could claim to be black if I so wished. But it’s not something that would cross anyone’s mind in Portugal. Or here, when my hair is straight.)

As for the racists on the left side…. I was extremely shocked not so long ago when someone told me with a straight face that the government needed to hire black people even for make work jobs, because as technology became more advanced, all these people were going to be unemployed. I didn’t say “Say what?” though I should have.  I mean, seriously? Up until that moment I’d never thought that being able to tan killed brain cells.  Never mind.

Moving right along, it occurs to me that telling these people “All lives matter” is in fact inadequate.

If we’re talking about deaths-by-police, well, you know, it’s not a problem. And if it’s death in life by government, yes, black people have it worse than many — most? — in the US. But how is identifying them as a group and giving them more government loving “care” make things better?

And if its’ crazy cakes insanity like what Bully Lament and Murder as an organized movement do, such as demanding that people just hand things over in reparations?

That’s just the insanity induced by Marxism. And it would work as well as Marxist redistribution does. I.e. total immiseration of everyone.

You see, people aren’t classes. Or colors. or any external characteristic.

People are individuals. Which means whatever things affect them personally they affect THEM not everyone else who looks like them.

While you can make a lot of noises about the generational effects of slavery, let’s be brutally honest, even 100 years ago most people were traumatized in ways we weren’t and ways that would break our kids.  We don’t know how that affects family culture, or individual lives. We just don’t know.

We know in the long run — though it would shock most graduates of American high schools — we’re ALL no matter what color descended from slaves and slave masters, from cannibals and rapists, from the raped and the tortured. There are no universal winners in the human race, only temporarily “privileged” people, and that privilege is often less than it seems.

I recently watched some crazy person tell us that the ability to go the new world and colonize was white privilege.  Let’s look it over: you get in a vessel that will take months to get somewhere you’ve never been, leaving your entire family behind, every tie, every connection, and you get to wrestle a living out of unfamiliar soil  This is an endeavor that killed most people. But hey, privilege!

Then there are the ones who claim death camp survivors have white privilege, something that would make you cry if it weren’t so funny.  Also, nauseating.

One starts to think that “privilege” as defined by the left might be a Marxist mirage.

Anyway, the point is yeah, given horrible schools, broken neighborhoods, and the fact that social programs have destroyed family structure, it is true black people have a harder time in America.

Who was it — sorry, no memory for celebrities, but it’s a black man — who said the way to end racism is to stop talking about race. Just stop it. Stop trying to turn it on its head. Stop telling me — a first generation immigrant, married to a man whose family never owned slaves — that I owe reparations to some black immigrant — say Ilhan Omar — who arrived in America this generation and who — yeah, surely — has slave ancestors, but NOT HERE.

Stop telling women, for that matter, that they should humiliate and mistreat men because women were humiliated and mistreated in former generations.  Sure, some women — not all — were.  But I can guarantee they weren’t mistreated and humiliated by any man alive today.  If a man alive today mistreats women PUNISH HIM, not all males in general.  And anyone who thinks a man deserves what is coming to him because some distant ancestor might have been an abuser, let me point out women can be abusers and tyrants too, and that you undoubtedly also have a lot of those in your ancestry.  All of us are descended from sinners, criminals, saints and martyrs. Of both sexes. AND more importantly, none of us are our ancestors OF EITHER SEX, OF ANY COLOR, OF ANY CONDITION.

Humans are individuals. And individual lives MATTER.  They matter profoundly.  In fact, to other humans they are the most important thing in this world.

I don’t care who your ancestors were, if you tan or not, or if your nose if like mine or tiny and inconsequential like my husband’s. I don’t even care if like me and the boys you have Neanderthal brow ridges.

I care that you are Human (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) and your own person.

It is not the government’s or the culture’s job to punish you for the crimes of people who look vaguely like you, long ago or now.  And it is not the government’s job to compensate you for the oppression of people who look vaguely like you, long ago or now.

It is not the government’s job to decide your potential and give you pity jobs, or chain you to low performing schools, no matter what your color is.

The government’s job is to treat you equally with other individuals under the law, with no prejudice in either direction.

And the government’s job is to guarantee your life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.  The later of which includes securing to you your property legally acquired, the fruit and sweat of your brow, and everything that gives life meaning.

Giving the government power to strip people of their property, either because they got in a stupid panic over a virus OR because they think they should hold you accountable for the crime of long dead people to whom you have no relation will only make sure that no lives matter.  Not mine, not yours, no matter what color the people living these lives are or think they are, or perhaps aspire to being.

Humans aren’t born responsible for the crimes of anyone but their own.

A system that punishes people for things they did not do is called INjustice. It has always been so. And you don’t create justice via injustice.

Stop lumping people in arbitrary groups and pitching them against each other in obedience to the system of a long dead and honestly very evil man.

Individual lives matter. They’re the only thing that matters. Let’s give people the freedom to live them to the fullest.

 

*For the previous chapters, please go here. These are posted first draft, as the brain dictates to the fingers which are remarkably stupid. Also there will be inconsistencies because until September or so, the timing on these is wonky, and I’ll forget stuff between posts. Eventually it will be cleaned up and fixed just before page is made secret/taken down and the book is published. At that time I will take lists of typos or volunteers to proof read. For now, it’s written in a hurry, usually an hour before it goes up. And, let me remind you, it’s free – SAH*

Problem And Path

Michael had never thought of swans as particularly sarcastic.  Which probably just went to show the limited understanding he had of poultry.  Because, though he could not understand what Geoff Blackley said in swan blerts, as he led Michael up the stairs and — by use of his beak — opened a closet door to reveal much male clothing of varying sizes, Michael was sure there were sarcastic comments along the lines of “Help yourself, why don’t you?”

The same in the bathroom whose ingenious construction fascinated Michael, as there was piped in hot water, whose temperature you could regulate with a turn of a dial, and Michael was sure the swan-trumpeting about that meant “The old geezer had a lot of time alone here and pleased himself by making the place comfortable.”

But it was only as Michael carrying a change of clothing stood by the bathtub and stared at the swan and before leaving the swan made a particularly trenchant trumpeting, that Michael though thought meant “Right, I’ll leave. It’s not like I want to see you naked, bucko,” that he was absolutely sure that swan had a sarcastic turn of phrase.

After Geoff left the bathroom, Michael washed.  The warm water on demand, and as much as he wanted, without having to worry about putting the servants out by making them carry endless buckets was an amazing convenience.  Particularly as the first tubfull was gritty with glass particles from Michael’s hair.

He wondered if Seraphim had got home, and what he’d found after the Gather had broken his window and stolen his brother.  He knew that Tristam Blackley had said that he was in a place impossible to find, but between Michael’s brothers, surely they would find him.

Then he sighed, because that was probably true, but it also meant that once more Michael would be rescued, and once more reveal himself the helpless younger brother who had to be rescued, yet again.

He wondered what had possessed Tristan to send the Gather to get him.  Surely he knew it would bring retribution from two very powerful men.

On the other hand, considering the magician’s position, isolated and and with his sons’ missing, one by one, perhaps he was desperate enough not to care?

When he finally felt clean and dried himself on a towel also magically kept warm,  and dressed in the really good quality but grey and rather bland clothes, Michael wondered how the clothes had got here. Had they been magicked in? He doubted that. He had some idea of what it took to magic objects past the betweener.  He could just about believe a Gather, but anything else, particularly the parts to make the elaborate water piping or the material for these clothes…. no.

He had to talk to Tristan Blackley. He must be a transmuter of no common skill.

It was only when fully dressed that it occurred to him he’d taken an untoward amount of time, and that surely he was being ungallant. he should have let Albinia wash first.

He hurried out the bathroom and almost collided with Albinia, looking much as she had in the drawing room of The Darkwater town home: her hair properly dressed, and wearing a dark green dress.

He stopped, and felt once more afflicted with not knowing what to say or how to say it.  So instead of speaking he cleared his throat, twice, finally managing to say in a voice not quite his own, “Oh I see you already bathed. I didn’t know there was another bath.”

She smiled a little. It was amazing how being washed and in fresh clothes made her look so grown up, like she knew more than a mere girl, like she was some ancient and powerful entity.  “They have three other baths, here. Remember for some time there were eight people living here.  It is more than a simple cottage.”

“So I perceive,” Michael said, and could kick himself for how stupid and supercilious he sounded. To make things worse, a divine smell of fresh-cooked food seemed to surround them, and his stomach growled most embarrassingly.

And almost immediately Tristan’s voice echoed up the stairs, “Dinner time, milord, and miss.”

And like that, on cue, the swan appeared, making a sound that could only be interpreted as “come on you ninnies.”

Albinia gave Michael an embarrassed smile and blushed under her freckles, which made him feel slightly better, as they followed the swan who moved at a pace just a little too fast for comfort.

He took them down the stairs, but instead of staying in the deceptively simple entrance room, they veered down a corridor, and into an ornate dining room, where Tristan sat at the head of the table, and three chairs slid back to allow them to sit. Well, Geoff simply jumped up on the chair, in front of a plate piled high with some sort of soft food that looked like meat with chopped greens.

“When I first got confined here,” Tristan said, conversationally. “There was only the front room, but I amused myself by adding to the house.  For about ten years, there was nothing else I could do, really.  So I had my fun.  And then once the boys joined me… Well, I did what I could to make this a civilized inhabitation for the Blakley family.

He looked at Al, “I see you made something feminine out of the provided clothes. Not a mean feat madam.”

It was quite a compliment from Tristan Blackley, and yet Michael found himself wondering at that “Madam.”  Like calling her “Whelp” in the letter, it was a very strange way for a father to refer to his daughter. Or to speak to her.  He supposed there was no love lost between Blackley and Albinia’s mother, but really.  Then again, it seemed to him, Blakley must be a very strange man.

As they sat, plates circulated, unseen, appearing at their side, as though being presented by accomplished servers.  There were cauliflower patties, and lobster, and some kind of roast fowl which made Michael look askance towards Geoff, wondering if he’d take offense. Not that there was any logical reason he should. It wasn’t as though he were naturally a fowl after all. Just an enchantment.

“It is a very ingenious setup you have here, sir,” Michael said, trying to break the ice.  “The kitchens, like the bath, I presume, run by magic.  I would at some time like to discuss what spells you used and how.  But–” He took a deep breath.  “I’d like to know how you got the smog Gather past the in betweener–”

“What?” Tristam had been eating steadily, with manners but with what was obviously a great appetite.  Michael supposed the transformation to and from wolf took a lot of energy. It normally did.  Even when not voluntary. it was a great magic.  But at Michael’s mention of the Gather, he stopped abruptly and let out that startled “What?”

He set his knife and fork down.  “Young man, the Gather was no magic of mine. I’d not kidnap someone much as I need rescue, and I know your family is not one to trifle with.”  He paused.  “I merely sensed it, and controlled it to come here, instead of taking you back to my Lady wife.”

“But the In Betweener…”

“It’s the nature of this …. prison of mine,” he said.  “Not as difficult as you’d think to pull things here.  It’s not a full fledged universe you know? just a pocket one, existing within a few square miles. That’s how I built it.”

“Sir, I don’t understand.”

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Since some of you — apparently — missed the announcement: I write Austen fanfic under Alyx Silver (or at least that’s the nom de publication.)  This one was the first one I wrote, though not the first one I published under that name.  Most other ones aren’t completely insane. This one, I’m afraid, IS.  (And yes, I’ll get it out in paper soon.)

FROM ALYX SILVER:   What if He Were to Pick Me: A Pride And Prejudice Variation With A Dash of Insanity.

What if Mr. Darcy, trying to avoid the appearance of being lofty and proud, so far mistook himself as to be charmed by Lydia Bennet?
How long could the fair strumpet lady hold his interest? How would Elizabeth Bennet feel about it?
As all the Bennet sisters fall into the strangest of relationships, you’ll fear you lost your mind. But you haven’t. Just grab your sweetie and a whip – in case of unruly pillows – and hire a Bennet coach to Gretna Green. They have the best carriages, and guarantee no one will catch you.
Then hold on to your hat. You’re in for the ride of your life.

 

FROM JERRY STRATTON:  The Dream of Poor Bazin: A Novel.

“All for One and One for All.” When Stephen Price Blair’s letter of introduction to White House Press Secretary Bobby Trevor is stolen by a mysterious Senator, he vows revenge against the most powerful people in DC. He risks his life, and his reputation as a journalist, to protect the President and Vice President from the plots of House Speaker Janet Richardson, and duels the Speaker’s journalists to advance the cause of beltway bipartisanship.

FROM CHROME OXIDE:  28 Minutes Into The Future.

 

Was there ever a time when the world needed to laugh more than it does right now? Thankfully, the cavalry has arrived. Nine rib-tickling, irreverent short stories take aim at political correctness and blow it to smithereens—in a hail of hilarity.”I found myself laughing with his tale[s] over and over.”—David Farland, New York Times Bestselling Author; and Coordinating Judge of the Writers of the Future contest”…entertainment pure and simple… a welcome breath of fresh air in an increasingly stuffy room…” —Dave Truesdale, Editor, Tangent Online”It’s terribly hard to write political commentary with such a strong sense of irony.”—The late, great Jerry Pournelle, John W. Campbell Award, Prometheus Award, Seiun Award, Heinlein Society Award,National Space Society’s Heinlein.

FROM BENJAMIN TYLER SMITH:   Blue Crucible.

The end came fast for Lieutenant Nathan Ward. One moment he was participating in an international convention of mounted police officers, the next he was in a command bunker watching the world’s two biggest Corporations—Obsidian and Teledyne—destroy it in an exchange of nuclear hellfire.

While Columbia, Missouri was spared a direct strike, a near-miss EMP fried most of the vehicles and the electrical grid. Then the Corporations started a shooting war in the streets, and they didn’t care who got caught in the crossfire. But Columbia was one of the last cities still standing, and Nathan and his fellow officers weren’t going to give it up. Even if it meant facing the worst the Corporate militaries could throw at them.

The Corporations had no intention of giving up the city, either, and Obsidian called in reinforcements to match Teledyne’s Specialist, a woman with the power to defeat a company of soldiers all on her own. Both Corporations intended to reign supreme and were willing to crush anyone who got in their way. In the post-apocalyptic world, there was only one law—theirs—and not the one with a badge.

The world may have fallen, but the Thin Blue Line’s battle is only beginning.

FROM ALLENE R. LOWREY:  Einarr and the Demon Fleet (The Adventures of Einarr Stigandersen Book 4).

FROM MARY CATELLI:  Winter’s Curse.

Who but a fool would linger after Zavrien laid his curse? Ill luck can kill — and all the more in Zavrien’s enchanted, endless winter, haunted with ice giants and frost fairies.

When the soldier Gareth is cursed, the young wizard Perriel learns how dangerous lingering can be.

But she can hold out a sliver of hope for breaking the curse — if it doesn’t break them first.

FROM ALMA T. C. BOYKIN:  Familiar Vows: Familiar Tales Book Fourteen.

From Familiars who horn in on their new mages to a quiet night with Master Saldovado and a sorceress with a single spell, nothing’s quite what it seems in this Familiar world.

Lelia and André just want a quiet wedding celebration, but his family seems determined to add excitement to things. Mike comes home to Riverton on leave and backs into an old problem. Eugene Moorehouse fixes a fence under closer supervision than he’d planned. And Martin and Chester discover that sometimes, a mage in need is a mage indeed.

Six short stories in the Familiar Tales universe.

 

Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike.

So what’s a vignette? You might know them as flash fiction, or even just sketches. We will provide a prompt each Sunday that you can use directly (including it in your work) or just as an inspiration. You, in turn, will write about 50 words (yes, we are going for short shorts! Not even a Drabble 100 words, just half that!). Then post it! For an additional challenge, you can aim to make it exactly 50 words, if you like.

We recommend that if you have an original vignette, you post that as a new reply. If you are commenting on someone’s vignette, then post that as a reply to the vignette. Comments — this is writing practice, so comments should be aimed at helping someone be a better writer, not at crushing them. And since these are likely to be drafts, don’t jump up and down too hard on typos and grammar.

If you have questions, feel free to ask.

Your writing prompt this week is: CAT.