It's alive.

Or, it's live.

I did it. The Shrinking Zone is live on Amazon. 

This is my 9th novel. 9 is the number of novels I have written. The novels I have written are 9 in number. It all began with Justice in Season, which I wrote back in 2000-2002, and put on the big river site in 2012. I followed that with Smoke, and the sequel to the first novel Justice Resurrgent in 2018. The following year I published Threading the Rude Eye, and Power to Hurt, the first two books in my alternate history fantasy Tomahawks and Dragon Fire series. The third book in the series, Clamorous Harbingers, came out in 2020. I published two more books in 2021: Promise of Carnage and Flame, book four in the Tomahawks and Dragon Fire series; and this new stand-alone, The Shrinking Zone. The more astute among you, or anyone who can count, may notice that that only totals 8 books. Well, I wrote another one, Finding Jack-The Orb, which is the first in a trilogy, but I have no idea when I'm going to get back to that trilogy, so I removed that book from Amazon.

That's all a lead-in to saying that the price of this 9th book shall be 99 cents. 99 cents shall be the price thereof. Get it. Get it now.

One weird thing -- The Amazon reviews of Smoke are showing up on The Shrinking Zone page. I don't know why.

What do you need to know about The Shrinking Zone? It's a fanfare for the common man. The protagonists aren't supermen or grizzled special forces veterans. They're working-class patriots and families. The location is not some exotic locale, but a rural area on the Snake River Plain. The stakes begin small, but rise with the tension and fast-paced action. If you have hope for America, The Shrinking Zone is the book for you. Get it before it becomes reality.

I'm on to book 5 in the alt-hist-fantasy series--which is already started.

_________

The festive illumination du Chateau du Chat Gris began on Saturday. The contractor and I did all we could until we could take the weather no longer. The weather we couldn't take was cold and gray like a concrete slab in winter--with the added bonus of a freezing wind to challenge our combined will. I did get started before he came, but had to take those lights down because parts of each strand were defective. My wife had played a nice trick. She had labeled the box, "lights for the trees" and also in a faint and faded marker had written, "need fixed." I did test each strand before I put it up, and cast aside any that were totally dead. The problem was that of the rest of the strands half or more of the lights didn't work. The problem became apparent after I ran power to them. The tree lights went up more quickly the second time when the contractor got into the tree. I was tempted to make a Legolas joke while he was up there, but none came to mind that were witty enough to be worth mentioning.

To complicate the illumination installation, I got a call from local law enforcement about a matter that required contacting the secretary who knows how to generate the appropriate paperwork, and coordinating with the judge who had to review and sign the right papers to make sure things happened in a timely manner. Ultimately, it didn't slow me down much, because the contractor continued stringing lights while I talked on the phone.

Finally, the contractor insisted that he beat me in a game of cribbage. I nearly prevented that, but I let him get one 15 too many (or is it two many in this case? You won't get that if you don't know how to play cribbage), so he was able to count out with a hand of only two. I had plenty of points in my hand and crib, but had to count second. Naturally, he wanted to move on to dinner rather than let me get even. My desire for revenge has been left to fester.

I was hoping for another round of gaming fun with Les Freres Corses, but they haven't been able to come over yet. I did get to do Legos with the Goose, but her and her sister spent most of their time with their grandma and the college girl who is home for the holiday.

Merry Christmas!

Yesterday I divested the curtilage of Christmas cheer and yuletide delight. In other words, I de-lighted the exterior of the grounds with a sortie to take down some enemy combatants the Christmas lights. Wife and daughter flew close air support. Wife gathered each strand as I defused it, one by one. Daughter a seek and destroy rescue mission on the strands around the deck.

For Christmas itself, we had sickness in a plain brown wrapper. Law Student and his lovely family came Christmas Eve. The little Manette girl already had something, and shared with our couch some of the things she had eaten earlier. Law Student felt as if he wanted to engage in similar sharing but avoided such ostentatious displays. Nevertheless, the Ice Queen and Thor declined to bring the Corsican Brothers to such an environment. The next day, after the joyous morn, with breakfast for some, Law Student et al abandoned us to our own sad company--like process servers who had fulfilled their commission.

That evening, the Ice Queen and Thor did bring the Corsican Brothers for a nice dinner starring an old, dead, piece of pig -- which was quite tasty. Wife cooked it in the crock pot so I had the holiday off from the usual (and time consuming) application of heat and smoke to raw meat products. We contended with one another via a couple new games. The Jumanji Jungle game and Monopoly for Millennials. Thor prevailed in Jumani, while daughter got us all in an early headlock in Monopoly and eventually forced us all into submission for the win.

By way of entertainment, I treated myself to a re-watch of The Incredibles 2 on Netflix. The overblown trumpet blast attacks are the best. I'm sure I mentioned that the first time I talked about the movie. Yes, I did--at least a little. I'm happy to report much fun in the re-watch.

Today I substituted for the teacher in Sunday School as we discussed the last half of the book of Revelation. I thought it went a lot like this:

Except maybe the train didn't get quite so far on to the bridge before it all collapsed. Nevertheless, there was a point during the lesson when I grasped a great truth--that made it all worth it for me.

***

With the new year approaching like a wrecking ball, it's time for resolutions. For me, I know that I will go back to writing a minimum word count on weekdays. I've simply been writing without worrying about how much I write. I'm going to want to complete books 3 and 4 next year in the Tomahawk and Dragon Fire series -- and books 1 and 2 are only 99 cents each until the 31st. I'm currently on chapter 6 of Book 3.

Of course, there is more to self improvement than augmenting the word count. While I was looking for a Christmas picture to add after the first paragraph, I came across the picture below from a quiz I had taken a couple years ago.

I'm not sure if I should resolve to go from moderate to high, or from moderate to mild.

"Bridge at Chalons" is the first episode of season 2 of Combat! It wasn't the next episode on my list for viewing. I found it looking for an episode with the theme of blowing a bridge as I wanted to try some WWII action for my skirmish game. The game has already proved itself with musketeers, frontiersmen and Indians, Martians, Trek, and probably a western on which I'm still working--but I digress. I won't do a review or recap here of this Combat! episode. I merely wanted to note that it scores 2 out of 3 on the Combat! Excellence Scale: 1. It featured combat, including a German 2-man machine gun firing from a cemetery, and grenades and explosives. 2. It wasn't about the NPCs. The guest star, Lee Marvin, did not disappoint, but he did not become the show. He also helped bring out the prominent character features/flaws in the regulars. Saunders got to shine, overcoming all obstacles, including the guest star. Only on point number 3 did the episode fail to please--there was little-to-no French spoken in the episode. I give it 4 of 5 on the combat score, 5 of 5 on the character and guest star score, and 0 of 5 on the French score for a total of 9 out of 15. It's definitely one I could enjoy re-watching. I'll probably re-watch when I do a review so I can get some pictures.

***

On a more serious note, the well pump handed in its resignation last Sunday. I managed to put off acceptance for a couple days until Tuesday when I had the time to replace it. Two things stand out about the whole experience. First, a fine friend not only helped with the pump replacement, he also did all the driving as we went to get the new hire and the requisite accessories. My dad, and son, and boss also came to assist in the project. Second, the new hire cost two to three times what it should have. HR was all accommodating in providing the replacement and everything else but deferred telling me the price when I asked, indicating we would settle up when I brought back the lifting tool they had lent to me for the task. I had priced new pumps and knew the expected range. I suspected that this pump would be at the high end of that spectrum. I did not expect it to be double the anticipated cost. Color me soured. There is no doubt whatsoever that I would have gone somewhere else if they had not hidden the cost until after I had installed the pump. I hope that was the last repair of the year. For Christmas, we have water. I may put a bow on the faucet.

***

Thanksgiving came this year in that fashion to which we have grown accustomed. We had a small gathering of part of the family. The turkey I smoked didn't turnout as fabulous as had the one last year, but it was good. Thor, the Ice Queen, and the Corsican Brothers came for the thankful festivities. (Thankfestivities? Thanktivities?) I persuaded Thor to test my skirmish game. He chose a Federation versus Klingons scenario in which a mysterious tractor beam had destroyed a Klingon battle cruiser and threatened to do the same to the Enterprise. Thor ran the Klingons who, always ready to attach blame to the Federation, refused all efforts at cooperation. Chekov had the only working phaser. He had not moved from his beam-down spot before the enemy disruptor killed him. Kirk elected to forego the combat advantage he had and attempted to persuade the Klingon commander of the necessity of cooperation if they were to have any chance of saving themselves. That commander rebuffed his pleas and burned him down where he stood. McCoy met the same fate, and he was armed with nothing more than a nonworking tricorder. When the tractor beam crushed the Enterprise, Scotty was cornered by Klingons and a venomous wolf-like creature. He never even got a chance to disable the beam. Ironically, Scotty, the last crewman standing, was the only model wearing a red shirt.

***

Snow and lights provided the theme for the rest of the weekend. Snow visited on Friday and drifted to a depth of nearly a foot--by which I mean the standard measurement, not someone's particular foot--in front of my garage. The new snowblower--and by "new" I mean I have no idea how old it is as it came from the estate of a friend who passed away earlier this year, but it's new to me--started right up and didn't die until I tried utilize it for its designated purpose. It wouldn't start again. I left it and shoveled for only a few minutes before I decided to put fresh gas in the blower and try again. It then started right up and did in fact blow snow--much of which the wind brought back into my face. It also left about a quarter inch of compacted snow in its wake. So I still had to shovel that.

Saturday morning drifted in like a breath exhaled in cold winter air, but it soon warmed up. When wife and daughter had finished their errands, wife asked me if I was going to put up the Christmas lights. The thought had not crossed my mind. Last year my son and I had joined in that activity. This year my wife helped. I'm not exaggerating much when I say that we did an entirely adequate job of stringing Christmas cheer about two and half sides of the abode, and adorning the crab apple and dead maple with polychromatic yuletide hopes. I think Polly Chromatic would make a good character name. Would she be an artist? A paint salesman? A singer who can't hold a note? As you can imagine, the possibilities are finite.

***

Now for a note on the progress of Book 3 (I really need a good title for this one) of Tomahawks and Dragon Fire: It is exciting. I'm only 40 some pages in, and I can already tell that this book is even more exciting and action-packed than the two previous entries in the series. Friday and Saturday, while others were shopping, I digitally carved some characters in motion. The aftermath of the big ending in Power to Hurt is slopping over into the next set of plot complications and character advancements with musket fire, tomahawk chops, and some magic which may have been suspected by the more astute readers but which had not previously been revealed. I have revealed written it. Where it goes remains to be seen. Is there more magic to come? Get the books now and find out.

*

This weekend began (and completed) the Christmasification--or is it Christmasization?--of the estate. Fils and his children Kned and Comedienne joined us to erect the brand new yuletide pine constructed of genuine and completely man-made materials. The fun also included the festive luminizing--or is it lumification?--of the exterior timber and mansion house perimeter. A word (or several) about those sobriquets: Fils is self-explanatory; I thought Kned (pronounced either with, or without the vocalized "K" ) sounded better than "dead president;" and Comedienne was the alternative to "Dickens' French girl"--also, she did comedic things like waking us up in the middle of the night several times in order to grace us with renditions of her greatest hits--which sounded a lot like the vocal tracks on a death metal album. She's a scream--literally. We were thrilled to have them. The vocal tracks were inconsequential in comparison to the joy they brought.

Fils and I did discover that putting the Christmas lights up might have gone more smoothly if we had either had more help, or been smarter; but we managed. At the completion of the job when we viewed the lights at night, I remarked, "I was hoping that they would look better than that." He responded, "I guess we had different visions about what we were doing." I don't know what he meant by that. I had visions of a luminous staff with celestial swirls of white light in the large tree accompanied by graceful arcs of warm red cheer in the smaller tree. At dark, we saw a crooked white staff with haphazard white lines in the vicinity next to some red scribbles. It was like Lite-Brite meets a broken Spirograph--two disappointing toys from my childhood (which I never owned but which were never as fun to try as they appeared to be on television). I did take another look at those lights. From one angle, the lights on the large tree reminded me of a dragon with wings outstretched; granted, that took some imagining, but who's to say it's not a Christmas miracle?

We also had our first fire of the season in the fire pit. Louis and Lucien (The Corsican Brothers), the children of my daughter the Ice Queen and her husband Thor, were at the house last night. They enjoyed the fire and roasting marshmallows. In point of fact, the brothers preferred throwing things, including marshmallows, into the fire as opposed to merely roasting them. The fringe benefit was that we could send the brothers back to their parents smelling strongly of smoke--which the Ice Queen hates. Good times!

***
The big news, of course--cue the trumpet fanfare--is that Justice Resurgent is now available for $0.99. Click the book cover image to go to the big river sales site for the book.

*The picture at the top of the post is a Remington-Beals .44 caliber--the type of pistol used by McBride in Justice in Season and Justice Resurgent.

I have mixed feelings about this book. When I did the re-read/corrections, there were parts I really liked; there were parts that I did not love; but the ending really decided me--I think it's the most moving ending that I've written to date.

***
Finally, last week I was nearly finished with Feval's Le Loup Blanc. I finished it the next day.

General Thoughts: See below.

Story in a nutshell: A noble of Bretagne in northwest France lets his hatred of the Kingdom of France lead him to leave his estate in the hands of a duplicitous "relative" named Vaunoy while he goes to challenge the king to personal combat. The estate is supposed to pass to the noble's grandson. The scoundrel Vaunoy wants it all to himself; he not only attempts to kill the grandson, he also kills the loyal dog--so we know he's beyond redemption. Grandson is rescued, only to immediately disappear. Grandson returns later without knowledge of his birthright. Le Loup Blanc and others help restore him to his rightful estate and title.

Do I recommend it? Yes. There are a number of interesting characters and this story strongly resembles that of Robin Hood and the return of King Richard. The grandson returns like King Richard. Vaunoy holds the power like King John. Le Loup Blanc and the men of the forest resemble Robin Hood and the merry men. Marie has the role of Maid Marian. The likenesses aren't exact, but the similarities are strong. I rate it: A Valiant Variant of the Robin Hood/King Richard story.

***
What did Ricardo Montalban say with regard to Paul's epistles to the saints of Corinth?
He called them fine Corinthian Letters.

Smoke and Lights

The little things, like an acknowledgment from a friend, can brighten an entire day. The first day of the year was a beautiful day.

Here's the rest of the day in a jumbled order--like you often get at many fast food places.

"Did you need anything else?" the cashier asked.

"No," I answered.

"Beautiful," she said with a smile as big as sunshine.

"Lots of people call me that," I said.

"I bet they do," she responded with a laugh.

"At [name of another store in town] the cashiers even ask for my phone number."

She looked puzzled. Apparently she found that difficult to believe. I felt slightly wounded. 

I elaborated. "In fact, they refuse to sell me anything if I don't give them my number."

"Oh," she laughed, understanding that that other store has that whole loyalty reward system based on customer telephone numbers.

After that it was pretty much just the total and, "Do you need a bag with that?" to end the conversation.

In fact, I did not need a bag...what with only getting the one item and all.

Backup. When I had found the item that I needed, and went to check out, the two open registers were backed up. Both had folks with baskets full of stuff. One of the registers was at a dead stop; there was either a problem with the register, or someone was checking a price; or perhaps invisible alien brain rays were slowly sucking their life away; I don't know; I'm just speculating. The lady at the register for returns saw my predicament and called me over. I recognized her. She's always trying to make conversation, so I felt safe with the, "Lots of people call me that," rejoinder.

Why was I at the store? I needed a temperature gauge for my smoker. The smoked prime rib I did for Christmas Eve dinner had been so delicious that wife wanted me to smoke something for dinner. I was going to smoke potatoes, and peppers, and steak. I had been doing all the smoking on the best guess principle and checking the temperature of the meat with a thermometer from time to time. I wanted to try something a little more precise. The system is completely manual, with charcoal and wood chips or chunks added whenever I feel a disturbance in the force requires action to bring balance.

I couldn't find a temperature gauge for a smoker. I did find one that goes inside an oven. It was cheap, a temporary measure.

The meal was delicious. The steaks took longer to cook than I had planned,but the low temperature smoke and the final searing really made them tasty--with no small thanks to my ad hoc rub creation. (I didn't actually add any hocks, or hawks, just various seasonings.) The little potatoes, bathed in olive oil and sprinkled with salt, pepper, Italian seasoning, and a hint of parsley pleased everyone. Daughter said it tasted just like fire--apparently she meant that in a good way, because she kept eating them. I should have made more of the potatoes, but I didn't expect daughter to like them. Wife fabricated a delicious salad that, with the olive oil and vinegar based dressing, created a refreshing palate cleanser between bites of steak and fire-flavored potatoes. I give the meal five stars.

Before the great fumigating of animal parts and edible flora began, I completed the traditional removal of the many little points of Yuletide radiance with their accompanying wire leashes. Although the temperature soon induced me to put on some gloves, I didn't need a hat (though I could have kneaded one to keep my fingers warm). The sun beamed in pale brilliance that lit the day like Capt. Kirk's face in a close-up with an alien babe. Speaking of babes, alien or otherwise, Wife assisted in boxing the lights as I took them down from the house and the trees. 

The lights are now covered by their cardboard bushels, to sing their message of cheer no more for 11 more months, but the refrain of their soft lustrous voices will linger in the heart the whole year through.