Assorted Notes

I don't do this often (for which I hope you're grateful), so please bear with me.

---

First, my sincerest thanks to those of you who've written to praise Freedom's Scion. Compared to the op-ed pieces I post here, writing fiction is much harder, but because of the pleasure a completed story can bring to others, it's far more satisfying. However, what's more satisfying still are:

• Favorable reviews at retail outlets,
• Revenue.

So to those of you who've purchased Freedom's Scion, or any of my other books, at SmashWords: If you have the time and the inclination, would you please post a review? It doesn't have to be long or elaborate; just a few words about what you thought of the book will more than suffice. And don't forget to include a "star rating!" Favorable reviews help to sell books, and the more, the better, as one of SmashWords's sorting techniques for customers perusing its offerings is by average review / number of reviews. You'll have my thanks.

And yes, Freedom's Scion will be made available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other retailers, just as soon as my cover artist can produce the permanent cover art. (She's very good, very modestly priced, and consequently very backed up.)

---

Second fiction-oriented note: Yes, I'm working on Freedom's Fury -- the sequel to Freedom's Scion and the completion of the Spooner Federation trilogy -- even as we speak. This one will take a while; I expect to have it ready some time in 2014. The confluence of the major threads and themes of the saga will require extremely careful handling. I expect that you'll be surprised by the resolution.

Quite frankly, I've been rather surprised by the passion of the reactions, both to Freedom's Scion and to the first volume, Which Art In Hope. At least, readers who've written to me about them have been quite passionate in their statements. They all but universally celebrate what they see as the core idea of the Spoonerite Hegira and Hope as I've depicted it: the absolute abjuration of the State. The yearnings they've expressed for such a world have been painfully poignant to read.

A goodly number of readers have explicitly asked whether I find the notion of a completely ungoverned world plausible. Up to now I've refrained from answering that question, because the answer is central to the plot of Freedom's Fury as I've conceived and planned it. But perhaps the time has come for a partial answer:

Yes...and no.

Satisfied? Hey, I said it would be a partial answer. If you want the complete, unexpurgated version, with all the necessary elaborations, justifications, exceptions, and footnotes, you'll have to wait for Freedom's Fury. And I expect you'll be surprised by the conclusions: both mine and yours.

---

Concerning the "Debunkings" series: In the first paragraph of the first segment, I made the following statement of intent:

These "Debunking" pieces will have a common aim: to tell you, in no uncertain terms, what you already know but are unwilling to admit to yourself.

I've received a few emails expressing puzzlement over that statement, so I suppose I should expand on it just a wee bit.

One of the most observant, most penetrating statements about our political lexicon comes from that considerable master of the English language, the great George Orwell:

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements. Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them. Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, "I believe in killing off your opponents when you can get good results by doing so." Probably, therefore, he will say something like this:

"While freely conceding that the Soviet regime exhibits certain features which the humanitarian may be inclined to deplore, we must, I think, agree that a certain curtailment of the right to political opposition is an unavoidable concomitant of transitional periods, and that the rigors which the Russian people have been called upon to undergo have been amply justified in the sphere of concrete achievement."

....Political language -- and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists -- is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.

I contend that:

• You know this;
• You have always known it;
• You allow it because you don't know how to fight it.

I am trying, most sincerely, to give you the tool you need. It's a simple tool:

Unpack the implications of the evil phrase and hold them up to the light of reality.

This must be done relentlessly, and hurled into the faces of the politicians using the evil, mendacious phrase.

Do you have the courage and the resolve for that? If so, the "Debunkings" series is your training ground. It has one or two more segments to run, but it will by no means complete the task of detoxifying today's political deceits. What I hope it will do is train you in the process involved.

I've done (and am still doing) my part. The rest is up to you.

---

You're probably aware that until recently, my health was in decline. I was pleased to experience a reversal of that trend, which appears to be holding steady...with one exception. Something has "gone wrong" in my left arm and shoulder. The panjandrums -- panjandra? -- of the medical-industrial complex are baffled by this malady; I've had more different diagnoses than Carter has Little Liver Pills. Whatever it is, it makes many physical chores painful to perform, including typing. Indeed, typing might just be the cause of the affliction; after all, I've done quite a lot of it for a very long time.

So I've begun to lean on a resource I'd previously disdained: voice recognition for text entry, in place of entry from the keyboard. Voice recognition software is better than it's ever been -- given what I remember from its early days, thank God for that -- but it's not perfect by any means. And of course, the same applies to me (though I'm willing to allow that I'm not "better than I've ever been"). So now and then, a mis-recognition by the voice-rec software will combine with an oversight by yours truly to produce...something other than I intended.

If you see the occasional howler in my pieces here, please be generous. Let me know about your discoveries in time to correct them before the men in the white coats decide they've finally got evidence enough, hoist their butterfly nets, and converge on Long Island with posters featuring my aged mug. That is, if Homeland Security and the IRS don't get me first.