2016: The Year in Review

Every year has its ups and downs, but for me, 2016 has been mostly ups. My family’s healthy, I’m healthy, and I can still write. Nothing to complain about. Still, it’s interesting to look back on just what happened over the past year and see where I’ve been.

On January 14, I released the sequel to The Blessed Man and the Witch, titled The Nephilim and the False Prophet . Darker than Blessed Man, it continues the story of a Biblical apocalypse and reveals more of not just Hell’s plan for Armageddon, but also Heaven’s. The Watcher angels also play a significant role; after all, they did say they wanted to save humanity. On January 27, I interviewed R.M. Huffman , author of Leviathan: Book One of the Antediluvian Legacy. Dr Huffman’s a skilled writer and a thoroughly decent fellow, and I’m honored to call him a friend.
February 1 marked my first published article for a horror website called The Slaughtered Bird. It’s a site I’m proud to be associated with. On February 3, I wrote a piece on  how not to get raped by immigrants in Europe. It included basic lessons in self-protection and made some people very angry. Any time you can make half-wits angry, you know you’ve done a good thing. On February 22, I wrote the most popular post on the blog: Red Flags and Ginger Nuts of Horror . It described how Jim Mcleod, owner of Ginger Nuts of Horror, kicked me off the site’s writing staff because I dared to express opinions about current events on my social sites. Opinions, by the way, that millions and millions of other people share. After kicking me off the site, he also called me, a Jewish man, a Nazi. At that point I pretty much stopped having anything to do with anyone closely associated with Ginger Nuts of Horror, a decision that has redounded to my personal and professional benefit many times over.
On March 9, a very kind reader named Judge Deadd compiled all the articles I had written on Ginger Nuts of Horror and archived them; Jim Mcleod deleted my articles from his site after kicking me off, thereby purging the Jew. On March 28, I wrote a piece in defense of Western civilization that I’m quite proud of. It included a trigger warning for those who find such things useful.
April was a busy month for the blog. On April 12 I wrote a piece on the North Carolina bathroom bill that got a lot of attention both here and where I cross-posted it at Liberty Island. It detailed the new front that the progressive left has opened up in the culture war: the redefinition of gender. Beginning April 18, I spent the week on the David A Riley/HWA fiasco , including critical analysis and an interview with Riley himself.  It must be read to be believed, and I’m pleased that I was able to shine a light on SJW BS once again.
On May 16, I wrote about how I quit Facebook . It’s a decision I have not once regretted in the more than six months since. For all its dubious benefits, Facebook is a gigantic time-suck. I miss the family photos and drive-by birthday greetings from friends I haven’t heard from since the last drive-by birthday greeting, but quitting the service is a net plus no matter how you slice it. On May 27, I wrote another fairly popular post: Writers as Political Activists . It detailed the unbelievably stupid open letter writers like Stephen King and Amy Tan signed, telling people who they should vote for in the 2016 presidential election. As it turned out, their political activism failed.
June was the month of giveaways, and on June 6, I described how, through various marketing sites, I had given away over 3200 copies of The Blessed Man and the Witch. This significantly boosted sales of The Nephilim and the False Prophet, so the giveaway was very successful. On June 20, in the aftermath of the Orlando shooting by Omar Mateen, a Muslim extremist, I published a piece on how media coverage of the attack drove people apart rather than bringing them together.
My July 4 piece struck a chord with many Americans, as it focused on what American exceptionalism actually means, and it’s not chest-beating about how great America is. (Though there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that and people who do that sort of thing are awesome and should be respected.)  On July 15, I discussed the Ghostbusters franchise reboot, showing how the new movie had become a social justice vehicle rather than a comedy/horror film. The reviews and social media efforts promoting the film reinforced that point.
On August 11 I wrote a letter to my formerly favorite department store, Target . It’s unfortunate that certain corporations have decided that virtue-signaling is more important than customer satisfaction, but that’s part of the world we live in now. Just remember than things weren’t like this not long ago, and keep in mind who’s been pushing a destructive, fringe agenda on an unwilling populace for quite some time. The season of weird cinema continued into late summer, and on August 25 I reviewed the movie Der Bunker .
On September 9 I wrote about the Mel Gibson movie Hacksaw Ridge and why I, as a Jew, wasn’t going to bother seeing it, or anything else Gibson made. I bookended the post with satirical commentary on what Jews really think and say. On September 27 I began an essay series on Fox’s new show The Exorcist,  a series I would continue through the next several episodes.
I wrote a piece that was well-received on October 3 for the website Scifi and Scary called Let’s Bring Objective Morality Back to Horror . In it I argued that vampires and demons without God, or a force of absolute good, lacked punch. On October 19, I wrote my first piece for The Loftus Party called Getting Along is Not Going Along, where I argued against reducing individuals to their political opinions (a theme that has colored the entire year).
On November 1, I talked about the results of the giveaway of my novella Dreadedin Chronicles: The Nameless City. Marketing indie-published titles is a crapshoot in many respects, and I discussed what worked and what didn’t. I analyzed the presidential election returns on November 9, focusing on the reaction to the results .
On December 2, I wrote a piece about the latest outrage and discussed why you shouldn’t do business with people who go out of their way to tell you how much they hate you. And finally, on December 27, I announced the republication of my book The Ultimate Guide to Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse . The revised and updated edition has a new chapter, new illustrations, and plenty of new information to get you through the undead-caused end of the world.

Being the pseudo-intellectual social commentator that I am, I suppose I should opine on 2016’s rash of celebrity deaths. While I don’t typically share it, I understand the grief we feel when a beloved performer dies. For brief periods we experience, vicariously, dangers and terrors and passions and delights through their performances, so it’s only natural to grieve when they go. Particularly when they die before their time, like Carrie Fisher. Or unexpectedly, like David Bowie and George Michael. As you think about Princess Leia, I ask that you also spare a thought or prayer for my wife’s uncle Bill, who passed on in late August. A navy veteran who served during the Vietnam war, he was a good man, and we miss him still.

Bill, we’ll all meet again some day.

Early next year I’ll have a new Kindle Single published, and my goal is to complete the third and final novel in my Armageddon trilogy, to be titled The Holy Warrior and the Last Angel. Along with more book reviews, movie reviews, and other original articles. Here’s to 2017.