THE DRAGON FACTORY, Jonathan Maberry

The Dragon Factory by Jonathan Maberry

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Joe Ledger and Echo Team are back, kicking ass and taking names, then checking the list of names and kicking everyone's ass again just to make sure. This time, Joe and the DMS (Department of Military Sciences) are up against not just one, but two teams of mad scientists monkeying around with the human genome. One group's literally making monsters; the other's winding up what they call the Extinction Clock for a multi-racial genocide that makes the Final Solution look puny.

This is another great, fast, fun read from Jonathan Maberry. There are a couple of spots where the multiple sets of villains make the story a little confusing ("Wait, which bad guy's island lair is this again?") There's also one spot where the story gets derailed for a stretch of exposition, including the dreaded "as you know Bob". But when the flag goes up and the shooting (and cutting, and punching and kicking, etc) starts, you forget all of this, because no one--no one--writes action scenes better than Jonathan Maberry. Part of the secret to that is that by the time the action begins, Maberry has given you enough of a peek into the warrior hearts of the characters that you really care what happens to them, and it hurts when they fall.

Highly recommended.

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War Is Over, If You Want It....

Mitt Romney criticizes Obama's spending in a "peacetime" economy.

This should come as a surprise to the people still fighting three wars, four if you count the GWOT. So can our troops come home now?

Then, of course, he had to backpedal: "He meant to say since World War II," a spokesman said later.

Wow. The government's spending more that it did in 1946. What a shock.

What an empty suit this guy is.

Today's Reading From The Book of Trump

Latest newspaper column:

It came to pass in those days that times grew lean among those whose job it was to mock and to ridicule the Powerful and the Silly.

The Snow Princess’ star had begun to fade in the North. The Chalkboard King had announced he was leaving the Fortress of the Fox. Even the Mad-Eyed Lady of the Cold Lands had shown a glimmer or two of sanity; forced to gaze upon a ­certified copy of the president’s birth ­certificate, she ­abandoned her demands that Obama prove his birthright and stated, “That’s what should settle it. … I take the president at his word. Introduce that, we’re done. Move on.”

And there was ­wailing and gnashing of teeth among the jesters and the merchants of the snark. “Who is able to be as crazy as these?” they cried. “And who shall be like unto them in mockability?”

But there were others who said, “Fear not. For it is written that in the darkest hour, a new buffoon shall rise, and great will be the silliness thereof.”

Then it came to pass that out of the Big Apple, one did come. Greatly did he bluster and strut. Hilarious was his hair, if hair it was. His name was Trump. He took up the banner of the Birthers, and did champion their cause, saying, “Lo, I have dispatched my minions to the Far Island, and there you will be amazed at that which they find. Just see if you aren’t. Real soon now.”

Greatly did his polls rise as the People of the Far Right, including the Birthers and the Baggers of Tea, did hail him, saying “We knew it! We always knew the president was not of our tribe and land, and soon shall he sit no more in the White Palace!”

And there was great rejoicing. But not just among the People of the Right.

“Whew,” said the makers of humor, “that was close. But now shall the jokes practically write themselves.” For Trump’s last job had been as Master of Celebrity Apprentices, leader and director of a motley crew of those who had once been Somebody, but who were now sad and diminished, having sojourned long in the Land of the Has-Beens.

“How can you take a man seriously as a candidate,” it was said, “who was recently on TV as the boss of Gary Busey, Meat Loaf, and some woman named NeNe?”

“He makes liberals angry,” said the People of the Right, “and verily, that’s all we need.”

The Humble Columnist spoke out then, saying, “You know he supported a Canadian-style health system, right?”

The people of the Right were sore amazed, saying “What?”

“In truth,” the Columnist said, “for thus it is written, in Trump’s book ‘The America We Deserve,’ that ‘we must have universal health care. I’m a conservative on most issues, but a ­liberal on this one. … The Canadian plan also helps Canadians live longer and healthier than Americans.”

“Stop! Stop!” said the People of the Right, and they did place their hands over their ears.

“Wait,” the Columnist did say, “for it doth get better. Thus it is also written by Trump: ‘By imposing a one-time 14.25 percent net-worth tax on the richest individuals and trusts, we can put America on sound financial footing for the next century.’ Soundeth like a tax increase on the wealthy to me.”

“Thou liest,” the People of the Right wailed. “The Donald is a conservative.”

“Nay,” that one said. “The Donald is a huckster. A showman. A con artist. Crazy he is, but as the fox is crazy. Verily, he shall tell thee anything he thinketh thou wantest to hear. He no more believeth thy Birther nonsense than he doth in the Easter Bunny. Ye rubes, ye have fallen for yet another grifter, this one in a bad comb-over.”

“Thou fearest the Donald,” they sobbed, “just as thou did the Snow Princess. Thou liberal, thou art filled with hate for conservatives, for they are successful.”

“Thou mayest tell thyself that if it doth make thee feel better,” said the Columnist, “but there shall I be when this one crasheth and burneth. And great shall be my mirth on that day. So long, suckers.”

Achtung!

I notice from the reports I get via Amazon that my e-book titles appear to be available now in the German Kindle store (or as they say it, "Kindle-shop"). Note that these are not, however, German translations. Sehr Gut!

What The Heck Do They WANT?

I'm Blogging today at Murderati about the greatest mystery of all: what do readers really want?

Review: THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO by Stieg Larsson

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Boy, does this book need an editor. There's actually a pretty good mystery here, but it's buried under layers of tedious exposition, unnecessary description, and especially Stieg Larsson's transparent Mary Sue-ism.

For those who aren't familiar with the term, a "Mary Sue" is a derogatory term in fan fiction for a character that is just a little too good to be true, and who is clearly an avatar of the writer. A Mary Sue character's painfully obvious purpose is fantasy fulfillment for said writer.

In this case, the late Stieg Larsson, a middle-aged Swedish magazine writer, has penned a novel about...a middle-aged Swedish magazine writer. Every woman in the book, including the title character, wants to sleep with him, because he's such a nice, mellow, undemanding guy. He solves a mystery that no one else could. After he solves the mystery, he spends a completely unnecessary 100+ more pages getting his revenge against people who were mean to him at the beginning of the book. And so on.

All that said, once the story actually gets going, it's interesting enough to keep you reading. I did finish it, but I doubt that I'll be reading the next two. I'll take a friend's advice and just watch the movies on Netflix.

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So Government CAN Create Jobs?

Latest Newspaper Column:

Hey, remember when it was an article of faith for Republicans that government couldn’t create jobs?

Remember how back in those days, the speaker of the House, Bawlin’ John Boehner, said in the weekly Republican address to the nation, “Small businesses are the engine of job creation in America; they actually create jobs, the government doesn’t”?

Wow, I remember that like it was just last week. Well, actually, it was two weeks ago, but who’s counting?

Boehner was just following the party line set by former GOP Chairman Michael Steele, who stated unequivocally back during the heated debate over the stimulus bill that “not in the history of mankind has the government ever created a job.”

Well, apparently, South Carolina Republican Lindsey Graham didn’t get that memo. Graham pitched a hissy fit last week over the fact that the recent budget deal that prevented a government shutdown left out a project dear to his heart: a $50,000 study on deepening the port of Charleston.

Now, 50K may not seem like a whole lot of money in a trillion-plus-dollar budget. But the lack of that money sent Graham so ballistic that he threatened to “tie the Senate in knots” and block every one of President Obama’s pending nominations if he didn’t get it back. Reports that he would hold his breath till he turned blue could not be confirmed at press time.

Of course, the actual deepening of the port and the channel would cost a heck of a lot more than 50,000 smackers; in fact, the estimate at this point is $350 million. The $50,000 would just be for the study on whether the port should be deepened to accommodate bigger cargo ships. In my ongoing campaign that I call “I’ll Do It For Half That,” I will answer that question “Yes,” but only if the government sends me $25,000. Cash or cashier’s check preferred.

When questioned as to why this little chunk of pork was worth tying the Senate in knots over, Graham apparently forgot the doctrine that government spending is useless for job creation. Federal spending on the port of Charleston, he asserted, would create jobs.

“If you’re a Republican and you want to create jobs, then you need to invest in infrastructure that will allow us to create jobs,” he said. “How can you create jobs by shutting a port down that 260,000 people depend on?”

It’s just another example of the cognitive dissonance that allowed 114 politicians, almost all of them Republicans, to bitterly oppose the stimulus package, vote against it, wail after it passed that it was the Death of the Republic — then not only to accept stimulus funds for projects in their districts, but to take credit for bringing those projects home and, in some cases, actually attend the ribbon-cutting for those projects.

Because remember, to a tea partier, it’s not “government spending” if money or services flow to them. To a politician, it’s only “pork” or “earmarks” if it goes to someone else’s district. And to all Republicans, it’s “job-killing” if it’s something President Obama wants; it’s “job-creating” if it’s something they want, and never mind the reality.

This may be why, according to a recent poll by the organization Public Policy Polling, “after a little more than three months in charge, House Republicans have fallen so far out of favor with the American public that it’s entirely possible Democrats could take back control of the House next year.”

According to the most recent PPP survey, “43 percent of voters think that House Republicans are doing a worse job now than the Democrats did, compared to only 36 percent who think the GOP has brought an improvement,” and that “46 percent of voters say that if there was an election for Congress today they would vote Democratic, compared to only 41 percent who would vote Republican.”

So, new bosses who look just the same as the old boss, let me ask you the question I heard ad nauseum during the first two years of the Obama Presidency: How’s that change thing workin’ for ya?

HOW I CAME TO WRITE THIS BOOK

Over at Patti Abbot's blog pattinase, I guest blog on the subject of HOW I CAME TO WRITE THIS BOOK.

BONESHAKER, Cherie Priest

Boneshaker by Cherie Priest

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Okay, I confess, you had me at "steampunk zombie airship adventure." I had to pick this one up after that.

Sixteen years ago, Leviticus Blue tested the Boneshaker, a magnificent machine built to tunnel into the ice in the frozen Yukon and dig out the gold sealed there. Unfortunately, the test went horribly awry, and a huge chunk of the newly founded city of Seattle caved in. Worse, the excavation released a poisonous gas that turned people into ravenous flesh-eating zombies. Now, the city is sealed behind an apparently impenetrable brick wall.

Briar Wilkes, Levi Blue's widow, ekes out a meager living on the Outskirts, the part of the city that remains outside the wall. She's a pariah, harassed by people who take out their anger for the destruction of the city on her. Her son Ezekiel goes under the wall to seek the answers that will clear his father's name. Briar goes after him. As it turns out, more than zombies live inside the wall, and there are more secrets than even Ezekiel suspects...

The good: this book really moves. You get right into the adventure, and there's flying and fighting and running and more fighting all the way through. And the steampunk setting and alternate history brilliantly uphold the Rule of Cool.

The bad: it's hard to really become engaged with these characters. Briar's aptly named, and Ezekiel just makes you want to smack him. Unfortunately, Priest is so eager to get you into the above-mentioned running and flying and fighting etc. that it's not till later in the book that you get beyond that to the place where you start to care if they live or die. That makes parts of the book a bit of a slog, airships and zombies notwithstanding.

Also, while Priest does provide some explanation as to why people would continue to inhabit a walled city where the very air can kill you if you're not ripped to shreds and eaten by the walking dead, it's never a really satisfying explanation. I mean, I know the Civil War's still raging back east, but hello? Zombies? Briar's revelation at the end was even more implausible, IMHO.

All that said, it was a quick, fun read, and worth picking up.

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I Feel Cheated We Don't Get the Day Off For This

Thanks to Dave Barry, I am reminded that today is International Louie Louie Day, which "provides an annual opportunity to celebrate the song that has been called best party song of all time, has been recorded more times than any other rock song in history, and was very nearly declared the official state song of Washington State."

Here's Iggy Pop's version:



So what'd you get me?

Crazy For Half the Price: I Submit Myself As a Candidate To Replace Glenn Beck

Latest Newspaper Column: The Pilot

This past week, the world of ­broadcasting was rocked by the news that Fox News host Glenn Beck would be leaving his five-day-a-week show on that TV network in the near future.

Beck’s announcement on the show was delivered in his classic Drama-Queen-of-the-Apocalypse style; he warned ominously of “dark waters ahead” and ­compared himself to Paul Revere, who “had to get off the horse eventually” and “go back to silversmithing.”

He promised, ­however, that “we will find each other again.” He did not, however, burst into tears, so I’ll have to give that ­performance only eight out of a possible 10 stars.

I’ve got to tell you, folks, this is ­getting plumb frustrating. First I find out, as I reported a couple of weeks ago, that Sarah Palin is beginning to suffer from slipping favorability ratings. Now I find out I’m not going to have Glenn Beck to make fun of anymore.

(We will have to pause for a moment. Now that I’ve mentioned Sarah Palin in a column, even in passing, we have to give her die-hard fans a chance to rush to their ­computers and compose the usual blizzard of “why-are-you- picking-on-Sarah-you-must-be-afraid-of-her-leave Sarah-alooooooone!” letters. It’s a Pavlov’s dogs kind of thing. The poor things can’t help it. OK, back now? Let’s continue.)

Speculation abounds as to the reasons behind the sudden announcement. Some point to Beck’s slipping ratings, which were down a whopping 30 percent from last year. Others point to the exodus of ­advertisers fearful of boycotts, or perhaps fearful that advertising exclusively to the paranoid and resentful might not provide sufficient market ­penetration.

Still others mention the frequent clashes Beck and his staff had with Fox execs, or the rumors that the news staff was growing increasingly uncomfortable with Beck.

Whatever the reason, there will soon be an open spot in Fox’s lineup. And your Humble Columnist knows the clarion call of opportunity ringing loud and clear when he hears it. So, dear readers, I am offering my services to the Fox Network. I am the man they need to replace Glenn Beck. After all, I’ve done TV. One of my first jobs was in radio. And, most important, I can be absolutely raving crazy for half the price.

I can sense the doubt in some of you. I know that there are those who think I can’t possibly equal Glenn Beck when it comes to lunacy. You think there’s no way I can top stunts like portraying financier George Soros as a “puppetmaster” — using actual puppets.

You think I don’t possess the bizarre sense of self-importance that would allow me to defend myself against my critics by quoting that famous poem about Jews and the Holocaust (“When they’re done with Fox,” Beck said, “and you decide to speak out on something. The old, ‘first they came for the Jews, and I wasn’t Jewish.’”)

You think I can’t get up in front of a camera with a chalkboard and draw an intricate and convoluted web of ­conspiracy that looks like something drawn by Russell Crowe’s schizophrenic mathematician character in “A Beautiful Mind,” one that links Woodrow Wilson, ACORN, Soros and the Rothschild ­family.

You think I can’t manage the kind of cognitive ­dissonance that lets me claim in one moment that I love America and in the next chortle with glee that we didn’t get to host the Olympics.

O ye of little faith. I tell you, I can be that insane. I may have to stay up for three days straight and down an entire bottle of straight tequila, but I know I can do that. I’ve done it before. The results aren’t going to be pretty, but I can make the sacrifice. Did I mention I’ll do it for half the price they’ve been paying Beck?

I’ll have to get a chalkboard from somewhere. Manly man that I am, I may have to get some ­glycerin drops for my eyes so I can cry on command, but these are trivial matters.

Help me out here, folks. Write or e-mail Fox and tell them to give me a shot. It’s my destiny. It’s America’s ­destiny. Without me, the socialists win and the country becomes a Muslim Caliphate ruled by secular Marxist Islamist fascists, Al Gore and the New Black Panther Party. I’m so terrified I’m ­weeping, and you should be too.

See? And that’s just a sample. So what are you ­waiting for?

Internationally Known Blowhard, Redux: LAWYERS, GUNS & MONEY Down Under

I've got an interview over at the Australian blog Indie eBooks, and there's a short excerpt from Lawyers Guns and Money. Thanks to Nadine for being a gracious host!

He Must Be a Writer (Click for Full Size)

Hey, Kids, Let's Put On a Show!

Blogging over at Murderati today about the new musical penned by Stephen King and John Mellencamp....and how we can get on this bandwagon.

Wingnuts Tying Themselves In Wing-Knots Over Libya

Latest Newspaper Column: The Pilot

One thing that’s been funny in the past couple of weeks is watching the Republicans twist themselves in knots over our latest war in Libya.

On the one hand, they don’t have any use for Moammar Gadhafi, and they sure do love it when bombs are falling on Muslims. On the other hand, the commander-in-chief is a man they loathe so much they can barely stand to acknowledge he’s even an American ­citizen. So they’re acting a mite confused and more incoherent than usual.

Take, for example, right-wing blogger and anti-Muslim fanatic Pamela Geller. On Feb. 20, Geller wrote that Libya was “slaughtering innocent civilians,” bitterly complained that she “fear[ed] Obama would do nothing,” and urged her readers, “Stand up for innocent victims: Urge the U.S., the European Union, and the U.N. not to turn a blind eye to this bloodbath.”

When Barack Obama ordered missile and air strikes on Libya, however, Geller screeched a much different tune. She asserted that “our boys” are now “fighting alongside al-Qaida jihadists and Libyan rebels.” She went on to say, “It should have been Iran. Period. Libya … makes no sense. Recipe: disaster.”

No, really, she writes like that.

The most prominent flip-flopper on this topic is GOP presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich. On March 7, Gingrich said he would “exercise a no-fly zone this evening” and that “we don’t need anyone’s permission.” On March 23, with American forces committed, Gingrich told “The Today Show,” “I would not have intervened. … There were a lot of other ways to affect Gadhafi.”

Meanwhile, the wingnuts continue to rail against the imaginary left for its perceived “hypocrisy” in not opposing this intervention. I say “imaginary left” because the group these people are so eternally heated up about bears little or no relationship to the left that exists here in America.

“The left has been quiet,” wrote John R. Guardiano in the American Spectator, “even as allied military operations against Libya commence. Why?”

Michael Filozof, of the ironically named blog “The American Thinker,” was even more indignant: “Where are the protesters? Where are the accusations that Obama is a liar and a Nazi? … Where are the cries for Obama's impeachment?”

Well, Mike, for accusations that Obama’s a liar and a Nazi, you’ll have to go to Glenn Beck or your friends in the tea party. But for protests and calls for Obama’s impeachment, you have to go no further than the group of nine Democratic lawmakers, including former presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, who loudly decried the unconstitutionality of the attacks in the Democratic Caucus conference call on March 19.

Kucinich himself demanded to know why this wasn’t “an impeachable offense.” (Kucinich later walked it back and said he had no intention of trying to bring articles of impeachment, most likely because he realized they had about as much chance of succeeding as the last time he tried it against Bush and Cheney.)

As for protests, the anti-war group Code Pink (which talk-show host Joe Scarborough falsely claimed has “done nothing”) held a rally and press conference on March 23 at the White House, complete with “signs in the shape of planes saying ‘Don’t Bomb Libya’ and other creative visuals,” according to its website.

To be sure, there are some liberals supporting this intervention. There is, to put it mildly, a quite lively debate going on in the progressive blogosphere over the subject. As I mentioned last week, I’m one of the ones who think this was the wrong thing to do, and it may come back to bite us on the behind in ways we can’t see and apparently haven’t thought too much about.

But if any of the people complaining about the left’s “silence” bothered to actually read what’s going on, rather than yelling about the “leftists” that exist only in their heads, they’d see that the actual left is anything but “silent” on this subject. Then again, ­reality never has been kind to them, so I guess they have no use for it.

Some would accuse them of inconsistency as well, but I’d ­disagree. They’re completely ­consistent on one principle, and one only: Everything Barack Obama does is wrong. If he’s not intervening, he’s wrong. If he does intervene, he’s wrong.

It’s the worst kind of cynical, destructive partisanship, and it’s based on the assumption that we’re all rubes who are too stupid to notice they can’t keep their ­stories straight from one week to the next, but it’s consistent.

Me On the BBC, Again

After my Monday appearance on BBC Radio, the fine folks at the Beeb had apparently not had enough of your Humble Blogger, so they asked me to appear on the TV version of World Have Your Say. Here it is.

I start in at about 29:30, appearing via Skype.

Ooooooohhh, SNAP!!!

ThinkProgress » Rand Paul Mocks Newt Gingrich: ‘He Has More War Positions Than He Has Wives’

PAUL: I was happy to see that Newt Gingrich has staked out a position on the war, a position, or two, or maybe three. I don’t know. I think he has more war positions than he’s had wives. [...]

There’s a big debate over there. Fox News can’t decide, what do they love more, bombing the Middle East or bashing the president? It’s like I was over there and there was an anchor going, they were pleading, can’t we do both? Can’t we bomb the Middle East and bash the president at the same time? How are we going to make this work?

Is it a sign of the Apocalypse that I'm agreeing with Rand Paul? It's the same feeling of disorientation I had when I heard someone on talk radio talking about how terrorism was the result of our meddling in Middle Eastern politics, nodding in agreement, and realizing with a start that I was listening to Pat Buchanan.

Strange days indeed....