Anna Utkin

Copyright 2017, Steven M. Moore

            Anna Utkin shut the library’s main door, locked it, and headed for her car. Her little Honda Civic awaited to take her to her one-bedroom apartment in the complex three miles from the Oakwood Public Library where she had worked the last ten years of her life. She smoothed her blouse after getting into the car and thought about dinner. Tonight maybe I’ll have a glass of red wine because today’s dinner will be a Salisbury steak meal. She always bought her TV dinners on sale, so the glass of wine would be the most expensive item, a full-bodied cabernet sauvignon from California.

As usual, when she pulled into her parking space, she remembered nothing about the trip. She’d made that trip twice a day for years—the drive was always the same. The only day she remembered was when she was hit about halfway home by the stranger who ran the only red light along the route. The burly man had blamed her, but there were witnesses, one of them a cop who was parked and enjoying his coffee and donut. That accident was the most excitement she’d ever had in Oakwood.

People still frequented the library—some readers looking for big city newspapers, some looking for NY Times bestsellers they couldn’t afford to buy, and some who wanted to read older books they’d missed and couldn’t find anywhere else. There were few kids. Students wrote their “research projects” using the internet these days—some of them even got away with cutting and pasting, and many homework assignments for common texts had answers posted on the internet too. The millennials were more into their smart phones and laptops than books, preferring a summary of To Kill a Mockingbird found on the internet to actually reading the book.

She worried about the future of public libraries.  She didn’t know if the modern world really needed librarians or libraries anymore, but she loved her library and its books. She was also a voracious reader and donated the books she purchased and read to the library so others could read them. They were print versions, so she didn’t have room to store them in her apartment anyway.

She ate her TV dinner while watching the ten o’clock news.  She then placed her own laptop on the tray after wiping up a few spatters. I wonder if my profile is ready.  She’d always been curious about her ancestry and ordered a DNA report in order to find out something about it. As an orphan, she had no family tree available, so that DNA report would be a good starting place for finding one.

***

            Anna had been waiting seven weeks for the DNA results. She logged onto her personal page and smiled. She had her report online. She opened the file. The smile turned to a frown.
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With Il Duce Trump, there are many things to worry about, but none more serious than an arms race. Nukes were and are in every fascist’s wet dreams. Think of what the world would become if Hitler’s atomic program had gelled. Think of what the Cuban Missile Crisis might have become if Nikita’s shoe tantrum had led to nuclear Armageddon. Every time a two-bit fascist shakes the nuclear club, that Doomsday Clock approaches closer to midnight.

Trump argues we can build more and better bombs than anyone else. This crazy policy isn’t the dandy’s game of an old-fashioned duel between Burr and Hamilton with old pistols, yet our dandy Il Duce is challenging the rest of the world’s fascist leaders to a duel (and maybe anyone else he doesn’t like?), and everyone else in the world will be innocent bystanders for the duelists. Potential candidates for Il Duce’s wrath? Leaders of France, Great Britain, India, Iran, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, and Russia—have I left anyone out?—are either fascists like Trump waving this dueling pistol or potential fascists who will do the same if the world continues to turn to fascism. It’s like a game of musical chairs: round and round we go, and, when Berlioz’s “March to the Gallows” stops, someone will shoot the first missiles. Given Il Duce’s thin skin, the first one will probably be Trump.

He’s so thin-skinned he’d like to censor SNL and ship Alec Baldwin off to Gitmo. Let’s hope he doesn’t confuse the nuclear codes with his Twitter account! Of course, most fascists are thin-skinned and raging paranoid hotheads, so that’s not surprising. What’s surprising to many of us and a large part of the world is that U.S. voters can elect a hot-headed fascist to be their president. Whatever popularity he has is beside the point. Hitler was popular. Stalin was popular. Castro was popular. Franco and Mussolini were popular. Putin is popular. Their attraction stemming from carefully cultivated cults of personality still exists in their respective countries. Once in Madrid I wasn’t almost trapped in a pro-Franco demonstration. Weeping crowds in Cuba over Castro’s ashes on tour is yet another example. People can love fascism…until it bites them in their butts.  Trump, if tweets are any indication, has enormous mandibles (made larger by his foot in his mouth, of course), so he will be biting us sooner than later (his cabinet is a big intolerable bite already).  The monster is loose and will soon be in the White House.

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…if you actually are an educated, thinking person, you will not be welcome in Washington, D.C. I know a couple of bright seventh graders who would not be welcome in Washington, D.C.—Kurt Vonnegut

***

Muddlin’ Through. Mary Jo Melendez is an ex-USN Master-at-Arms who is ready to start her new civilian life as a security guard. She is framed for her sister and brother-in-law’s murders. This mystery/suspense/thriller novel describes how she works to clear her name and pay back the group that framed her. In the process, she discovers the MECHs, Mechanically Enhanced Cybernetic Humans, and an intense romance as she runs around the U.S., South America, and Europe. Available in all ebook formats through Amazon and Smashwords and its retailers.

In libris libertas!

[Whip me with an Udon noodle because I don’t do enough of these. These reviews are short—not as short as the average Amazon review—but, like everyone else, unless I write a review shortly after finishing a book, my procrastination becomes infinite. Here are two books, though, that are certainly worthy to read. Enjoy.]

The Billion Dollar Spy. David E. Hoffman, author (Anchor, 2015). This was a gift from someone. Anchor is a subsidiary of Random House (who distributes the book), so the book is overpriced. Thanks to whoever gave it to me as a gift. It’s non-fiction but reads like a spy novel. While Putin has declined to follow his foreign minister’s advice to expel U.S. diplomats who enjoy that oligarchical paradise known as Mother Russia, all in retaliation for Obama’s actions (and those in retaliation for the cyberattack on his beloved DNC), the Cold War was difficult for the CIA as they tried to find spies in Moscow. This is the story about their most successful recruit and his handlers. A lot of this material was undoubtedly classified TOP SECRET for decades. So fascinating I added it to the “Steve’s Bookshelf” page! As they say, truth is stranger than fiction.

Dark Secret. Edward M. Lerner, author. (Phoenix Pick, 2016.) Can six people start a new human civilization out among the stars? They can with frozen and fertilized embryos and a lot of science and technology to back them up. Their adventure begins when a gamma ray burst from two merging neutron stars gives the Mars colony’s VIPs only a short time to prepare an expedition to preserve the human race. The teeming billions of Earth and Mars are doomed, so the six have to muddle on.

Human nature being what it is, the probability there will be one power-hungry fanatic among them is certainty. Ask yourself what the choir boys in Lord of the Flies would become if brainwashed by such a warped individual—that’s the danger the other five face. Sinister, exploitive danger generated by one individual with Hitler-like aspirations.

This sci-fi novel can be many things to many readers—dark psychological drama, extrapolative science, post-apocalyptic tale, refined space opera—but entertaining will be all their common denominators. The title is a play on words. The planet is named Dark, but the fanatical despot in the tale has a dark secret until the nefarious plans become known to the other five. Better than your average sci-fi story, I must say. Well done, Mr. Lerner!

In libris libertas!

No, I’m not channeling Salvador Dali. I’m referring to what I remember about a book I’ve read. I’m familiar with my own, of course, but it’s interesting how I remember others. Or don’t.

Have you ever started reading a book only to remember you’ve already read it? Sometimes I get fifty pages or more into a book when some part of it stimulates that realization. Other times it hits me in just a few pages. When that book is a used one I just happened to buy off a bargain cart, I don’t feel so bad compared to a hardbound someone paid good money for (not me these days—I’m way past $100 textbooks and even ebooks more than $5).

This persistence of memory is tricky. I remember books I disliked as well as ones I liked, maybe even more so. I remember negatives just as well as positives (Harry Potter was entertaining but Rowling is verbose; The Martian was clever but the details about potato farming dull and boring; and so forth). I remember antagonists as well as protagonists (Voldemort in Harry Potter; the mission manager in The Martian). I remember venues and situations (Harry Potter underwater; an impossible windstorm on Mars). And, of course, I remember clever plots and terrible ones.

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What do you like to read? Reading tastes vary, but my stories are in the popular genres of mystery, thrillers, crime, suspense, and sci-fi—I might write a “crossover story,” but it will have things in common with those genres (a genre is just a keyword these days, after all). I don’t do romance, erotica, fantasy, or horror. Sure, my stories can contain romance and horror—the first is a positive aspect of the human condition, the second is often a negative. I know a few authors who write that stuff (cozy mysteries and dark fantasy too), and they’re so good I can understand why their books are read, but I can’t write them, so I have to be a sometimes reader and admirer of their writing skills. That said, my mantra for what I write is simple: if each story entertains just one reader, I consider it a success.

Readers wanting freebies. I can’t seem to give it away—PDFs free for the asking, that is. No cost to me (OK, fun time I spend), so no cost to you. You might not be interested in my little course about writing fiction—that’s really for writers—but why not the short story collections and novellas? Send me an email and say what you’d like to receive. I’ll never divulge that email, and will delete it in fact unless you want to subscribe to the email version of this newsletter (it’s less frequent and more oriented to readers).

Speaking like a native. My new mystery/suspense/thriller novel Rembrandt’s Angel (coming this spring from Penmore Press) features Scotland Yard Inspector Esther Brookstone, so I had to review some differences between American and British English (Ms. Brookstone has a lively way with words). There are variations within American English and British English too. In Speaking American (I suppose the title is a nod to the UK because we Yanks don’t speak the Queen’s English by any stretch of the imagination), Josh Katz notes a few differences that go beyond regional dialects like Bostonian v. Texan. Here’s a short list of how different words are used on the East Coast v. West Coast for the same concept:

East                                                                                       West

sneakers                                                                              tennis shoes

yard sale                                                                              garage sale

skillet                                                                                    frying pan

scallions                                                                               green onions

lightning bug                                                                      firefly

turnpike                                                                               toll road

highway                                                                               freeway

middle school                                                                    junior high

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The battles in our culture wars often mystify me.  The testosterone v. estrogen title Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, besides being non-chivalrous by putting men first, sums up one culture war where battles are often fought. What mystifies me is that I think there’s nothing to fight about.  I’m a unisex kind of guy—I open doors for anyone, although I’m getting to the age where anyone under fifty should open the door for me. That age also means that people should offer me a seat on the train or bus, but I’ll often go the other way just to be nice. Mom called it being a gentleman.

While race has little to do with the feminine and masculine mystique, Rodney King’s question echoes here too: “Why can’t we just get along?” Respect for fellow human beings should be a habit, independent of race or ethnicity, religious preferences (or lack thereof), sexual orientation, most political beliefs (where guns and knives aren’t used to proselytize), and gender. That’s the creed my parents practiced, and I have never considered changing it.

So, let’s talk about some of my other related personal beliefs. I believe women are better grounded in reality for the most part, quick-reacting but less emotional about most issues, not afraid of showing their emotions when it’s appropriate, and often more intelligent and often better at using their smarts than men. I’m also the first to admit that I benefitted from men being in control in my old day-job, but I commiserated with female scientists, programmers, and technicians as they struggled to rise in that testosterone-rich environment, and I have always enjoyed working with women of all ages.

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Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.—Jonathan Swift

***

Rogue Planet. Hidden away from near-Earth planets in remote spiral arms of the Galaxy are Human worlds that have lost contact with more progressive worlds and reverted to strange and primitive customs and traditions, their leaders using religion, superstition, and imported technologies to rule in tyranny.  Survey ships explored and catalogued these planets as suitable for future colonization centuries earlier, but groups with a special interest in ensuring a homogeneous and often despotic society didn’t bother applying for permission to colonize.

Following the ITUIP (Interstellar Trade Union of Independent Planets) Protocol, ships are restricted to observe and maintain a hands-off policy for these rogue planets, even when there is great temptation to intervene.  Eden, where a theocracy rules with an iron fist, is such a planet.  A group of rebels struggles to end the oppressive regime to forge a new future.

Available in all ebook formats and print. Read for free by writing an honest review (query through my contact page).

In libris libertas!

To all readers and reviewers, friends and followers, and connections on Goodreads, Facebook, LinkedIn and elsewhere, and to your own friends and family, have a safe, happy New Year and prosperous, secure, and healthy lives for all of 2017.

In libris libertas!

New Year’s resolutions never work for me. I have the same problem most people have: making them impossible to keep. This is the time everyone reassesses their goals and priorities, though, so I’ll jump on that bandwagon. Although I do that continuously, and make choices I often follow to completion, sometimes to my detriment, call this my writing plan for 2017. (Don’t writing gurus tell you to always have one, and that will guarantee you a bestseller?)

First, I want to do a bit more socializing on the internet. I’ll confess I get lost in my writing and forget about Goodreads (GR), my favorite social media site, and Facebook (FB), where I mostly post small things on my author page, hopefully of universal appeal to readers and writers. I’ve adapted to the censorship on LinkedIn (LI) a bit more and hope to start participating in their writing business-related discussion groups again, even though I get spammed with everything from writing job offers to guarantees from some geek that s/he can make this blog the most read on the internet! I don’t socialize much anymore, so social media seems the way to go in order to meet interesting people.

You might have noticed that I’ve been writing a lot more short stories recently. I went through a period where most story ideas turned into novels. I like the short story and novella format, though, so, instead of leaving them hidden (and often unfinished) on my hard drives, the second part of my 2017 plan is to either post them to this blog or send them off to ezines (where they might languish too, but that’s fate). The few remaining magazines (Ellory Queen, Fantasy and Science Fiction, and so forth) just aren’t worth my time or trouble (and the editors have always seemed like clones of Robert Goodell).

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