Steven M. Moore's Blog, page 108
March 16, 2017
Person and POV…
Let me take you back to your language lessons—English or some other language will do—and remind you that “person” tells us who is speaking, or, in the case of literature, who’s writing: I live; you (s) live; he, she, it lives; we live; you (pl) live; and they live. Sometimes the pronouns are understood—Russian and Spanish often do that—and if you’re a minimalist writer (“hard-boiled” for crime stories) you might write, “Went to the convenience store to pick up a burn phone,” when the pronoun...
March 14, 2017
Trumpcare…
So we have another horror story associated with the current White House AKA the DC Dark Place. The Warlock-in-Chief is championing his new healthcare bill, although people like Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell have also pranced around the bubbling cauldron to conjure up the best poison they can find for the infirm and elderly in America. Let’s first analyze the chief features of this wicked potion.
The individual mandate of the ACA will be repealed. While even that wasn’t enough to drive millenn...
March 13, 2017
Monday words of wisdom…
The United States is the only major nation in the industrialized world that does not guarantee health care as a right for its people.—Bernie Sanders
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Full Medical. One of my pet themes is the healthcare crisis in America. I’ve been thinking about it for years. This was my first book (now in an ebook second edition) and is still current today. With Obamacare now threatened by repeal and replacement by the horribly messy and unethical Trumpcare, the theme here seems more and more plausible....
March 9, 2017
Author v. character…
When an author writes her or his novel and opinions are expressed, readers might pause and ask, “Is this the author’s opinion or the character’s?” Here’s the danger: a reader might quote an author and say s/he supports a position when s/he really doesn’t! In today’s politically charged and toxic environment, that might create a PR and marketing nightmare. It could also be a matter of life and death in a country where opinions contrary to the regime aren’t allowed. Or where a religious majorit...
March 8, 2017
News and Notices from the Writing Trenches #140…
Calling all horror/fantasy writers. I saw an old movie recently. Although it was really bad, bad enough that I don’t remember the title, I found it entertaining. At the end the heroine buries pages of some demonic how-to book in the Bonneville Salt Flats to keep a warlock safely stashed away in hell. What’s that about? I’d never heard of salt being good for stopping evil magic. Anyone out there care to educate me? Does it work? I can think of several places to use it in politics—for example,...
March 7, 2017
Post-mortem of a speech to Congress…
In some dilating time machine or Mr. Trump’s parallel universe, ages have passed since he gave that speech to Congress. In real life, it was only a week ago—can you believe it? Everything he said is meaningless now, so dissecting that rambling rhetoric of a delusional man is anti-climactic. But let’s do it anyway because the president left the Twitter-sphere long enough to sound presidential and hide his narcissistic psychosis.
It’s curious that the media, after the president declared them to...
March 2, 2017
Apocalypse redux…
Redux = brought back, revived. We’re talking about the apocalypse again. Apocalypse is the event. While a dystopian society can cause it or be its aftermath, post-apocalyptic is reserved for the aftermath. There is a resurgence in these themes now. Everyone knows the reason: what’s happening in the U.S. right now as well as across the world has frightening parallels with 1930’s Germany, Italy, and Spain as well as with the darkest days of the Cold War. There’s nothing religious about this apo...
February 28, 2017
Does Trump have a human side?
Or his cronies and supporters, for that matter? Compassion and human kindness seem to be absent as the ogres lash out at all their perceived enemies. During the long campaign, I guessed he and like-minded individuals were lacking in these qualities, but I never guessed it could be so bad, and there’s every indication that it will become worse as parallels with 1930’s Germany continue to increase. One Facebook friend likened his takeover of the government to this generation’s Pearl Harbor. Tha...
February 27, 2017
Monday words of wisdom…
Social Security can pay every penny owed for the next 18 years. Lift the cap on taxable income and it’ll be solvent for decades.—Bernie Sanders
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The entire “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” is now available on Smashwords in all ebook formats, with #7, Gaia and the Goliaths, the most recent addition. #2, Angels Need Not Apply, will be on sale there starting March 1. Of course, the entire ebook series is also available on Amazon. Don’t miss the adventures of these crime-fighting cops...
February 23, 2017
Fake news and misleading stats…
Hmm…LinkedIn? Now that Microsoft owns them, you have to wonder what they’re using that website for beyond ads. They’re certainly discouraging discussion groups, my favorite feature, but for what reason? Maybe they realize they can’t compete with Google or Facebook—the former makes a major portion of its profit from ads, although Google+ is weak compared to both in discussions, and the latter is trying to catch up with the ads but lights up with discussions.
They all have fake news. Should we...
