Christopher L. Bennett's Blog, page 15

Schedule for Shore Leave 42

The schedule of Shore Leave panels and events is now up:

Schedule

I’ve signed up for a fair number of panels on Friday and Saturday, assuming everything goes smoothly with my car repair and travel. (I dropped off the car a bit over an hour ago, and they said they didn’t think it would take too long to fix — I hope they’re right. I tried out the car clip for my phone, and it worked okay, making it somewhat easier to see the GPS screen. I discovered I could use an elastic hair band over the clip ends from behind to hold the phone in the clip a bit more snugly. The drawback of the vent clip is that I’m not supposed to use it when the car heater is on, but that won’t be an issue until winter.)

Here’s where you’ll hopefully see me this weekend:

Friday, July 15

4pm, Salon F: The Latest and Greatest

David Mack, Richard C. White, Russ Colchamiro, Sherri Cook Woosley, Danielle Ackley-McPhail, Heather E. Hutsell, Keith R.A. DeCandido, Christopher L. Bennett, Christopher D. Abbott

Come find out what our authors have been working on! Hear about their newest books—and their next ones.

8pm, Salon E: Kick-Ass Heroes Who Don’t Kick Ass

Rigel Ailur, Keith R.A. DeCandido, Christopher L. Bennett, Susan Olesen, TJ Perkins

What heroes triumph using brilliance, smarts, cleverness, guile, etc., instead of violence? The Doctor comes to mind, as do some iterations of Wonder Woman. Who else? Does that aspect of their character get overlooked too often and not receive the credit it deserves?

10pm-Midnight, Hunt-Valley Hallway: Meet The Pros

Meet your favorite Author and buy your favorite books from our Bookseller.

Saturday, July 16

10am, Belmont: eSpec Books Presents

Danielle Ackley-McPhail, Aaron Rosenberg, Keith R.A. DeCandido, Russ Colchamiro, Mike McPhail, Jenifer Purcell Rosenberg, Hildy Silverman, Christopher L. Bennett

The newest from eSpec Books

12pm, Derby: Worldbuilding & the Star Trek Universe

Amy Imhoff, Kelli Fitzpatrick, Derek Attico, Greg Cox, Dayton Ward, CLB

Encompassing all of what’s new in Trek, from the shows to Star Trek Online to tie-in properties like comics, novels, and other media, this IP is expanding, with new creators and production designers bringing fresh perspectives.

2pm, Derby: Truly Alien Beings

Rigel Ailur, CLB, David Mack, Laura Ware

When have Star Trek and other franchises done uniquely different entities really well, and when not so well? Is this different from the fantastical—but not alien—creatures in Star Wars, Harry Potter, and Doctor Who? If so, how?

Sunday, July 17

1pm, Salon F: The Game Is Afoot!

Michael Jan Friedman, Mary Fan, Roberto Rogow, Christopher D. Abbot, CLB

Sherlock Holmes never goes out of style, yet the famed sleuth is seeing renewed life with various stories, novellas, and two rumored series in the works with Robert Downey, Jr. Why does the man from Baker Street endure after all these years?

It seems I don’t really have any new or recent Star Trek projects to talk about, since there doesn’t appear to be a Star Trek Adventures panel this year. But I’ll be able to talk about my Arachne novels and Tangent Knights, and my past couple of Trek novels might come up somewhere.

Preparing for Shore Leave

We’re only five days from Shore Leave now, so only four days before I head out. I’ve been taking a few steps to get ready.

For one thing, I decided it was finally time to buy one of those things that lets you mount your smartphone in your car. For years now, I’ve just kept the phone in the cup holder between seats when I used GPS, which meant I had to look pretty far down to see the screen, which is less than ideal. Since I’m concerned with safety after being out of practice with long drives, I figured a phone mount would be a real help.

I couldn’t afford one of those elaborate stem-and-base ones that mount atop the dashboard, but I went looking at local stores for one of those little clips that you stick onto the air vent slats, which generally sell for only a few dollars. I didn’t find anything suitable at the stores I checked, but I did pick up some iced coffee and trail mix for the trip.

I got really gung-ho about this problem the other day for some reason, and after taking two separate walking trips to local stores with no result, I got caught up in trying to figure out some way to rig up a homemade phone mount. There are internet videos for such a thing, but I didn’t seem to have the appropriate parts. I realized, after experimenting a bit in the car, that the phone (in “widescreen” orientation) would fit neatly into the depression at the base of the ashtray/lighter compartment, which of course I never use anyway. (It’s a 2001 car, so it still had an ashtray/lighter.) That was only a little bit forward from the cup holder, but it might have given a somewhat better angle. It only fit in loosely, though, and might fall out from car vibrations. So I had the thought of creating some kind of lip around the depression to hold it in. I noticed I had some rope caulk lying around, and thought that might be worth a try.

I never got around to the attempt, though. Yesterday, it occurred to me belatedly that I should really get hold of some N95 masks. I picked up my allotted three free masks when the government handed them out months ago, and haven’t actually used any of them yet, but three isn’t enough, and the masks provided don’t seal well around my nose, so I don’t trust them not to fog my glasses. (Plus an imperfect seal defeats the purpose anyway.) So I did some research into what some of the best masks were, and ordered a set of 10 NIOSH-compliant masks from Amazon yesterday. While I was at it, I went ahead and bought a 6-dollar phone mount clip. However, since my previous Amazon order was delayed by a few days due to a delivery mixup, I didn’t want to take any chances, so I paid extra for one-day delivery.

As it happens, the Amazon driver was timely, but it’s fortunate that I was tracking the van on the site and was watching out from my balcony, since the driver left my delivery on the wrong doorstep, two doors down in my apartment complex, even though the building numbers are quite prominently displayed on the front windows. I didn’t have a chance to get out the front door and call to him before he was gone, but it was easy enough to pick up my items just after he left.

I promptly took the phone clip down to my car to see how it worked, and it took a little trial and error to determine that it needs to be mounted low on the vent grille, otherwise its weight tilts the vent downward. It also doesn’t clip the phone quite as firmly as I’d like, but I think I just need to make sure it’s fully inserted and completely flat against the back of the clip, since if it’s at an angle, the spring pressure pushes it out. I also have to clip the phone a bit below center to make sure the clip isn’t depressing the on/off button on the side. (Maybe I should put the clip around the phone first and then attach it to the vent.) Still, it looks like it should work adequately, and should be at least a somewhat better placement for the phone/GPS than the cup holder was, or the ashtray depression would’ve been.

As for the N95 masks, they’re still sealed in a bag, but they clearly have some pretty heavy, robust metal nose clips built in, so hopefully that means no fogged glasses.

Usually on my trips, I bring along a metal flask of filtered ice water, plus I put my 2-quart plastic jug of filtered water in the freezer overnight beforehand so I have replacement ice water all day. Now, in the past few years, I’ve started buying iced tea bags, the result of a grocery substitution mixup that turned out to my advantage. So it occurred to me that I could make a batch of iced tea, pour it into a washed-out empty 2-quart juice bottle, and freeze it overnight as well. That way I get a bit of extra caffeination on my drive.

The biggest thing I have yet to do is to take my car in for maintenance, which will be tomorrow morning. As I mentioned last time, I hope they can get it fixed promptly, since I’m cutting it kind of close.

In short, I’m spending a fair amount for this trip. Gas prices seem to be on the way down at last, but it seems unlikely that I’ll sell enough books at the con to turn a profit for the whole thing. As I mentioned before, though, readers can help me out through PayPal donations or Patreon subscriptions.

Shore Leave is back

Well, it’s been a few years, but the Shore Leave convention in Baltimore is finally being held physically again, from July 15-17 at what’s now known as the Delta Hotels Baltimore Hunt Valley. I plan to attend.

https://www.shore-leave.com/

I’m actually rather nervous about it, because the pandemic is still raging. But the convention’s COVID policy requires all attendees to be vaccinated, and I just got my second booster last week. I’m concerned that masks are encouraged but not required, but I’ll certainly be staying masked.

Honestly, I’ve been sorely tempted to cancel and just stay home. I’ve become quite a hermit since the pandemic started, and I have a strong urge just to remain here in my cocoon and not take any avoidable risks. It’s not just COVID; this will be my first long drive in three years, and not only are gas prices high due to the fuel companies’ price gouging, but I gather the rate of traffic accidents has risen sharply since the pandemic.

But I think the strength of the fear I’m feeling is exactly why I need to resist it and do this anyway. I can’t let myself be paralyzed by fear for the rest of my life. These are scary times, but life has to go on even in such times. I do miss seeing my writer friends, and Shore Leave can be an opportunity for networking, which is important as I seek to line up new work for the latter part of the year and beyond. Plus it’s my first chance to promote the Arachne duology and Tangent Knights in public, and sell signed copies of Arachne and my last couple of Star Trek books, which will hopefully let me turn a small profit from the trip (assuming gas and car maintenance don’t eat it all up). And with my vaccination freshly updated, I’m probably about as protected as I can be. Besides, if so many of my fellow writers feel it’s reasonably safe to do this, I guess I’m at no more risk than they are, and the only difference is whether I let my fear control me. Fear has held me back too often in my life, and I’ve regretted it too many times.

Indeed, these past few years have been a rough patch for me and I’ve been dealing with depression. If I backed out and missed the chance to see my friends and my readers for the first time in three years, I’d regret it and maybe sink deeper into depression. And that’s a health risk as much as COVID is. I need to take a chance on living my life again.

Anyway, I just did some browsing, and it looks like the traffic accident rate is in proportion to the number of miles driven, so maybe it’s not a real increase in danger, just a statistical artifact of people driving more (perhaps because they’re flying less?). It also seems to be linked largely to speeding and not wearing seatbelts, and I’m a pretty safe driver as a rule. I’ve been driving since 2008, and I’ve only been in one accident, on the way home from Shore Leave a decade ago, which only resulted in two flat tires and a cracked side mirror.

Still, my car is way overdue for maintenance and a significant electrical repair I’ve been putting off. I’m trying to schedule an appointment with the garage recommended for that repair by my usual garage, but apparently they can’t see me until next week, and I hope I haven’t put it off too long. I always procrastinate and cut things too close.

Anyway, hopefully I’ll get the car sorted and I won’t chicken out, and will see some of you (or at least the top halves of your faces) at Shore Leave a bit over a week from now.

And just a reminder, if anyone would like to help out with my transportation expenses, you can use the PayPal “Donate” button here on Written Worlds, or subscribe to my Patreon.

TANGENT KNIGHTS 2: TEMPEST TOSSED is out today!

Today is the release date for Tangent Knights 2: Tempest Tossed, the second installment in my trilogy of full-cast audionovels set in an original science fiction universe inspired by the armored superheroes of Japanese tokusatsu TV.

https://www.graphicaudio.net/tangent-knights-2-tempest-tossed.html

Cover art by Amelia Grace Buff

GraphicAudio’s spectacular original super-heroic series powers on to new heights of action and intrigue, available in no other format!

In a world where communication with parallel Tangent Earths has brought a disruptive influx of new beliefs and scientific innovation, college-student and fangirl Corazon Kagami continues to discover astonishing new facets to the abilities she’s unexpectedly acquired in the accident that transformed her into Tangent Knight Caprice, the foremost of a growing ensemble of armored super-warriors very much like the heroes and villains of her favorite tokusatsu shows.

Earth-shattering revelations about her technology magnate mother Morgan Herrera and her cyborg security team Fireforce have put Cory on the side of Matrix, the interdimensional law enforcement agency tasked with bringing Morgan to justice. Daniel Vajra, the Tangent Knight called Tempest, is increasingly driven by his pursuit of vengeance against those responsible for his sister Meera’s death, and an astonishing confrontation with Fireforce’s powerful new warrior pushes him over the edge. Tempest’s desperate use of dangerous, largely untested cutting-edge tangent tech weaponry in his vengeful quest sends him out of control, a menace to foe and friend alike.

You can hear a sample clip or buy the book at the above link, and an MP-3 CD edition will be available in mid-July. Of course, Book 1: Caprice of Fate is still available too: https://www.graphicaudio.net/tangent-knights-1-caprice-of-fate.html

New Troubleshooter vignette on Patreon

I’ve been neglecting my Fiction tier on Patreon lately due to other work, but I’ve finally put up something new, continuing my commemoration of the 10th anniversary of Only Superhuman, my first original novel. “Origin Stories: Homecoming” started as a deleted scene from the original, longer draft of Only Superhuman, depicting the moment when Emerald Blair decided to enlist in the Troubleshooter Corps, a decision she only described in retrospect in the final novel. But the scene by itself was a bit thin, so I ended up fleshing it out into a whole story. It doesn’t really warrant annotations, but I do have a short page of story notes up on the Behind the Scenes tier.

Meanwhile, since even I was having trouble searching for older posts on my Patreon, I went through the whole backlog and put together a Patreon Fiction Index here on my main site. Between that and the Patreon Review Index, it should now be easier to find anything on my Patreon. I’m hoping that seeing everything I have to offer there will inspire some of you to subscribe, at least long enough to read the backlog.

As I say on the index pages, Patreon supporters help provide me with a small but steady income, which is valuable to me given the irregular nature of my writing work. I just had a worrisome week when my payment for a writing project was delayed and I wasn’t sure it would come in time to pay my bills; it ended up arriving just in the nick of time. I’m now out of the woods for at least the next few months, but my work opportunities beyond my immediate next project are uncertain. So any additional cushion I can get is very much appreciated.

Announcing TANGENT KNIGHTS 2: TEMPEST TOSSED!

GraphicAudio has posted the cover and blurb for the second installment of Tangent Knights, my original audio drama trilogy.

https://www.graphicaudio.net/tangent-knights-2-tempest-tossed.html

Cover art by Amelia Grace Buff

GraphicAudio’s spectacular original super-heroic series powers on to new heights of action and intrigue, available in no other format!

In a world where communication with parallel Tangent Earths has brought a disruptive influx of new beliefs and scientific innovation, college-student and fangirl Corazon Kagami continues to discover astonishing new facets to the abilities she’s unexpectedly acquired in the accident that transformed her into Tangent Knight Caprice, the foremost of a growing ensemble of armored super-warriors very much like the heroes and villains of her favorite tokusatsu shows.

Earth-shattering revelations about her technology magnate mother Morgan Herrera and her cyborg security team Fireforce have put Cory on the side of Matrix, the interdimensional law enforcement agency tasked with bringing Morgan to justice. Daniel Vajra, the Tangent Knight called Tempest, is increasingly driven by his pursuit of vengeance against those responsible for his sister Meera’s death, and an astonishing confrontation with Fireforce’s powerful new warrior pushes him over the edge. Tempest’s desperate use of dangerous, largely untested cutting-edge tangent tech weaponry in his vengeful quest sends him out of control, a menace to foe and friend alike.

Yes, it’s been a long wait since Caprice of Fate came out last August, but Tempest Tossed is finally almost upon us. Tokusatsu fans who enjoyed Caprice of Fate‘s homages to Kamen Rider, Super Sentai/Power Rangers, and Ultraman will find even more to enjoy in Tempest Tossed. There’s a lot more Showa Era in this one, some oddly familiar locations, and some classic tropes I had enormous fun figuring out how to pull off in Tangent Knights‘ reasonably plausible hard-SF universe. More importantly, the story and character arcs get bigger and more epic with lots of intense conflict and emotion, ramping up both the drama and the comedy along with the action and danger, in the tokusatsu tradition. This story contains some of my favorite character writing that I’ve ever done.

You can preorder now at the above link, and the book will be released in digital download format on June 27, with MP-3 CDs available in mid-July.

New Patreon TV review series: STARMAN (1986)

I’m a bit late in mentioning that I’ve started a new review series on my Patreon site. I’m covering the 1986 Starman TV series which starred Robert Hays (star of Airplane! and the voice of Iron Man in ’90s animation), C. B. Barnes (better known as Christopher Daniel Barnes, voice of Spider-Man in ’90s animation and of the prince in Disney’s The Little Mermaid), and Michael Cavanaugh (Riker’s former captain from one Star Trek: The Next Generation episode). The show was based on the 1984 John Carpenter movie of the same name starring Jeff Bridges and Karen Allen, and I open the series with a free recap/review of the movie, available for everyone to read, though the rest of the reviews will be on the $5/month tier. The film was a gentle science fiction love story, Carpenter’s attempt to show he wasn’t just a horror director, and was moderately successful. The TV series was a similarly gentle, family-friendly sequel in which the alien “Starman” returned to raise his now-teenage son, retconning the events of the movie back a dozen years, which was problematical due to the film’s dependence on the Voyager space probe launched only 7 years before the movie came out. Despite that, the series was one of the few reasonably good, smart science fiction shows on American TV prior to the late ’80s. Or at least that’s how I remembered it; if you want to see how it holds up for me today, you’ll have to read my reviews.

I’ve also updated my Patreon review index here on Written Worlds, so it’s now current and includes all my Roar reviews.

Assorted thoughts on STAR TREK: TMP: The Director’s Edition HD update

I just finished watching the new high-definition update to the 2001 Director’s Edition of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, which David C. Fein and Michael Matessino oversaw under the guidance of the late Robert Wise, attempting to complete the film as Wise would have intended to do in 1979 if he hadn’t been forced to release an unfinished rough cut prematurely. Readers of my first ST novel, Ex Machina, probably know how fond I am of the Director’s Edition, considering it greatly superior to the theatrical cut in terms of pacing, visuals, sound design, and so forth.

However, the big limitation of the DE was that it was only made in standard definition, including its new CGI effects that were only rendered at that resolution. Fein & Matessino always hoped to redo it in HD, but it took about as long for them to achieve that as it took for Wise to get the DE made in the first place. (For some reason, the credits on the 2022 HD edition refer to the original DE as the 2000 edition instead of 2001, so let’s just say it’s been roughly the same amount of time.) In addition, they completely redid the film’s color grading to improve the look, and made a few new tweaks to the visuals, as discussed here. The film is now streaming on Paramount+, and will be out on Blu-Ray later on.

I’ve been busy writing and haven’t found the time to watch until now, so here are some assorted thoughts, nothing too detailed.

The clarity of the film is definitely much greater. I noticed things I don’t think I ever caught before. I even almost recognized Mark Lenard’s face under the makeup of the Klingon Commander in the opening.The color grading is definitely better. The uniforms are less drab; the colors are still very understated, but you can tell the senior officers’ uniforms are pale blue rather than gray. And the bridge scenes look much brighter than before. The bridge was lit relatively dimly so the film loops behind the monitors would be visible, so the colors were drab in the original DE’s bridge scenes even though they were brighter in other scenes. Now, that’s been fixed, though there’s still a quality to the light and shading in the bridge scenes that lets you tell it wasn’t intrinsically as bright as elsewhere.More than the sets or VFX, what I noticed most were the nuances in the actors’ performances. TMP has a reputation as a dry, passionless film, but the actors seemed more expressive this time around.They finally fixed the officer’s lounge windows!! The private conversation between Kirk, McCoy, and the Kolinahr-cold Spock was meant to take place in the lounge seen in miniature when Spock’s shuttle docks, but they didn’t have the budget to build it full-scale, so they built a makeshift lounge out of leftover pieces of the rec deck set, which didn’t make much structural sense. The original DE at least put a CGI nacelle in the windows, matching how it would look from the rec deck, but the set doesn’t fit within the rec deck. TMP designer Andrew Probert did a sketch reconciling the two lounges, but the “windows” in the lounge scene had to be handwaved as viewscreens, which is how I referred to them in Ex Machina. (More here.) But the new DE finally, finally replaces those damn square windows with the correct lounge background! Kirk’s and McCoy’s profiles get a little blurry when they move in front of it, but I don’t care, since it’s so great that they finally fixed this problem after 43 years. And nobody seems to have remarked on it so far as I’ve seen, so it was a delightful surprise.I’m not sure it really sank in before how much Robert Wise tells a non-verbal love story between Decker and the Ilia probe in the climactic sequence in the Voyager 6 chamber, just by focusing the camera on them as they stare meaningfully at each other while the expository dialogue goes on in the background. The directing has to do all the work to set up why Decker chooses to join with V’Ger/Ilia, since the originally scripted exposition about Decker’s interest in spirituality and higher planes of being was cut out. The way it’s staged, it’s as if Decker is communing with V’Ger through the Ilia probe, the two/three of them coming to a wordless understanding that leads to his climactic act.When I realized that, I realized something else: The Borg Queen is to the Borg as the Ilia probe is to V’Ger. I mean, in-story they’re opposites; the probe is more like a drone, subordinate to V’Ger rather than dominant like the Queen. But in narrative terms, as roles and storytelling devices, they serve the same purpose, to provide the audience with an anthropomorphic spokesbeing for an impersonal superintelligence.There oughtta be a law against streaming services automatically shrinking the end credits by default. They should all do what Netflix does and give us a choice whether we want that or not.

Trackpad travails

In breaking in my new keyboard, I’ve been having some issues with the built-in trackpad. There were a couple of occasions where it started glitching, the cursor dragging spontaneously to the side and the scroll strip (the equivalent of a mouse wheel) no longer working. I found I could reset it by unplugging the keyboard and plugging it back in, but it happened twice within the first few days, then again a bit over a week later. There was one time when scrolling worked intermittently and came on and off with no clear rhyme or reason. Also, the sensitivity of the pad seemed variable; sometimes it got so sensitive that I kept accidentally clicking on things while just trying to move the cursor across them.

So I was concerned I might have to swap it for a different keyboard, but when I went to Amazon to look into the return policy, I saw a troubleshooting page, and after looking it over, I realized the problem was probably that the driver hadn’t installed right, because I’d ignored the instruction to shut down the computer before plugging in the keyboard. I really don’t like to shut down or reboot my laptop, because it takes forever. I usually just hibernate it at night.

So I tried rebooting it at last, and after that, the pad seemed to stabilize. The sensitivity was normal again, and its behavior was consistent for a few days. It still tends to be slow to respond; I have to move my finger over it a bit before it starts to work, so if I try clicking or tapping it “cold” after not moving the cursor for a while, the click doesn’t go through. I wondered if this was another driver issue, but since it’s been pretty consistent from the get-go, I suspect it’s a built-in feature to guard against accidental clicks, or something. Not ideal, but I can get used to it.

But a couple of days ago, the scrolling stopped working again, and I had to unplug/replug the keyboard. I may have to try something more than just rebooting; the troubleshooting page suggested uninstalling the driver, shutting down, then plugging it in and rebooting. Of course, then I’d have to use the laptop’s own keyboard to shut it down, a bit more involved (since I keep the laptop sort of halfway under the desk on a wire rack for ventilation, so I have to kneel down and pull it out to access its keyboard). So I’ve been hesitating to do that.

See, I realized that the past couple of times the trackpad glitched, it was when I tried using it with damp fingers. (I’m a very frequent hand-washer.) So I’m wondering if maybe this is not a driver problem; maybe this particular trackpad just gets confused by the coldness or spread-out contact when there’s moisture on the pad. So maybe reinstalling the driver wouldn’t do anything.

Another possibility suggested on the troubleshooting page was interference with the USB port, suggesting plugging it into another port. The problem is that I don’t have a lot of options there. The ports in my laptop itself are taken or inaccessible. (The speaker jack stopped working several years back and I had to get a USB speaker/mic adapter that’s wide enough to block the adjacent port.) So my only real options are the ports on my USB hub, and if one of them had interference, they all might. And somehow it doesn’t really seem like an interference problem at this point.

I really should try the uninstall/reboot thing just on general principles, but I’m lazy. For now, I’m just waiting to see if the pad glitches again without moisture being involved.

I guess I put up with my old keyboard’s dirty contacts and responsiveness problems for so long, constantly having to fiddle with the left button and push it at just the right angle and pressure to get it to engage after multiple false starts, that having a keyboard that works fine aside from occasionally having to be plugged back in — or one that works fine as long as I keep my fingers dry — seems like a minor inconvenience by comparison, one I can live with in the same way.

Anyway, if anyone has any insights based on the symptoms I described, feel free to comment.

New Patreon short story: “You Have Arrived at Your Predestination”

It’s been a while, but I’ve finally got a new, fully original short story up on my Patreon’s $10 Fiction tier:

Fiction: “You Have Arrived at Your Predestination”

This is a story that got away from me, turning out with a completely different tone than I’d envisioned. I shelved it and figured I might try again, but on revisiting it, I felt it wasn’t a bad story and was at least worth putting on Patreon.

As usual, you can read more about the creative process and so forth on the $12 Behind the Scenes tier:

“You Have Arrived at Your Predestination” Annotations

In other writing news, I have a paying gig lined up now that I can’t talk about, but it should be just about enough to keep me afloat for about the rest of the year, giving me breathing room to line up further work later in the year and hopefully get a bit better than “afloat.” I’m also doing a bit more work for Star Trek Adventures, something a little different and very cool.

But I don’t get paid for those until they’re done, so money’s still tight for me right now, especially with tax time coming up. So this would be a good time for folks to sign onto my Patreon to read my stories, even if it’s just for a month or two.