[Note from Steve: If you’ve downloaded “Mayhem, Murder, and Music,” the free collection of short crime fiction—see the “Free Stuff & Contests” web page if you haven’t—you know that music often inspires me. It’s always been part of my life. I even attempted once to write a Broadway-style musical based on Huxley’s Ape and Essence. (It’s now shredded—I didn’t get much further than a rousing march, “Seventy-Six Trombones” in an apocalyptic setting). This series of posts was also inspired by music. I might even repeat some of the songs from that collection! Enjoy.]

Like Neil Diamond’s existential song of the title (I love the version where a 70-piece orchestra accompanies him—it was recorded along with other famous songs on the CD at the famous Abbey Road Studios), this post is an ode to the loneliness of the artist. Whether writer, musician, painter, potter, or sculpturer, creating art is often a lonely pursuit, at least in the creative part. Diamond might have received inspiration from NYC streets for “Beautiful Noise” (also on that CD), but I’ll wager he was alone in his NYC apartment when he composed both the songs mentioned here. (Ironically, cities are often very lonely places.)

Writers of fiction, even as they mirror the romance, comedy, and tragedy of human existence in their prose, must go it alone. Patterson might have 300+ novels to his name, but his “co-authors,” who wrote a lot of them, still worked alone, as he did in his first books. Like a painter with his brushes, palette, and easel (my father was one), the writer paints with words within the solitary confinement of his story, reaching out to readers as if to slice away at that loneliness.

It’s a big decision for any creative to take: Choose loneliness in order to create. Most people can’t do it; or they don’t want to do it, thinking that creating art just creates more loneliness. There’s some truth to the latter, but creating art also is a cure for loneliness, medicine that with the proper dosage kills the ennui of disconnection.

Or maybe it’s not a decision but an addiction? Some people must create; they can’t help themselves. They’ve decided the loneliness of the creator is an obstacle they’re willing to jump over in order to be creative. And whether other people can benefit from and admire those creations or not, the creatives can still revel in their creations. That satisfaction relieves the loneliness.

I suppose there’s also the satisfaction that some creations might live on after we leave this “mortal coil.” This is one reason I include end notes in every novel. I think every author should. While it might be possible to piece together a writer’s creative life  just using her or his novels, the reason for writing them has some importance, if only as a last blow against loneliness. In my case, someone could patch together a decent biography of my life, but I suspect no one will! Yet my novels will live on, at least for a time, as evidence of my creative life…and my loneliness.

***

Comments are always welcome.

Rogue Planet. Perhaps you’re familiar with my Chaos Chronicles Trilogy Collection. Did you know several stories are set in that same sci-fi universe, including the Dr. Carlos tales and A. B. Carolan’s first three YA sci-fi mysteries? Rogue Planet is another one, and it has some Game-of-Throne aspects while still being hard sci-fi. A young prince’s planet is ruled by an oppressive theocracy that has led to a quarantine by ITUIP (Interstellar Trade Union of Independent Planets). He strives to defeat the theocracy’s leader and bring the planet back from the galaxy’s Dark Ages.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Authors like to talk about their works-in-progress (WIPs). I’d rather call them writing projects. Most of writing is DIY, up to a certain point (unless you’re James Patterson using co-authors to keep his book assembly line going). An author assembles a story like a DIY home construction project, without instructions or blueprints, of course.

I usually forget about how I assemble each of my stories—the process and the motivations. (No, I’m not going senile. I’ve just written a lot of stories!) Remodeling a kitchen or bathroom is a project that needs some kind of plan. A story, especially a novel, is no different, even if you’re a seat-of-pants writer like me, creating the story as I go with only a general plot and themes in mind. This is why my novels have end notes, a commentary that’s as useful and interesting for me to jog my memory later as it might be for readers who have finished the book. Unlike most authors, I include them in almost every book. As a reader, I appreciate it when other authors do the same.

Also unlike most authors, I often have several projects ongoing. That helps my writing because I come back to a manuscript fresh each time. (I suppose blogging can accomplish the same thing, but a blog post usually isn’t a story.) Multiple projects also help me do the content editing for each one.

So what are my current projects?

“Friday Fiction.” When I start a story, it can become short fiction (a short story or novella) or a novel, more often the former now (dashes are over more quickly than marathons). I now give away my short fiction, either in some blog posts or as free downloads (see the “Free Stuff & Contests” web page at this site for a list). You’ve seen the beginning of the novella “The Prodigal Son” (archived in “Friday Fiction,” of course). This will be followed by “Poetic Justice” and “The Conference,” two more British-style mystery novellas.

The Denisovan Trilogy, Books Two and Three. Book One is already published, so these two are projects. I want to know what happens to Kayla Jones as much as some readers do. For me and them, A.B. Carolan needs to get his butt in gear! These novels, unlike the first, will take place “out there somewhere,” not on Earth—stories about the descendants of ancient hominins in space, if you will.

The Last Humans: Long Days (tentative title). Readers of the first two novels probably realized there might be another novel in the making to complete the trilogy. Penny Castro has more battles to fight, this time with what remains of the Russian government. (Because of Amazon’s error made by confusing the first two books, my motivation here is a bit low. Unlike the second, you can bet I won’t put this third novel for sale on Amazon!)

More than Human: The Complete and Unabridged History. This is a big project. I want to expand and continue the saga of Homo sapiens 2.0 and their Mensan buddies found in More than Human: The Mensa Contagion. We left it with humans and Mensans in a starship heading for a star near Sol yet not visible to the unaided eye. As with Kayla Jones, I want to know what happens with Captain Kensha, her XO Sara, and the starship’s crew. Maybe you do too.

“Esther Brookstone Art Detective.” You now have five novels in this British-style mystery and thriller series. In the middle one, Death on the Danube, principal characters Esther and Bastiann got married, but they even had a mystery to solve on their honeymoon cruise down the Danube. I didn’t stop there. Two more books involve crimes on Esther’s home turf. I have some tentative ideas for more novels; we’ll see if they gel. These novels are my longest to date, so the next one would be long too…a real marathon I’d have to run again.

I can’t guarantee that I’ll be able to complete any of these projects. I might even lose interest in some of them. I hope readers will be understanding. After all, I haven’t signed a contract with a traditional publisher to deliver a finished manuscript for any of these future stories. (I’ve experimented with traditional publishing, but I shall not repeat that experiment. I’ve been burned twice now.)

In this post, I just wanted to let readers know that I’m working on several projects. My addiction to storytelling continues, at least for now. (Amazon and other bad players make my motivation more difficult to come by with time, though.) I’m sure that I’ll leave this “mortal coil” with projects uncompleted. That’s inevitable…and the curse of any storyteller.

***

Comments are always welcome.

Rogue Planet. Perhaps you’re familiar with my Chaos Chronicles Trilogy Collection. Did you know several stories are set in that same sci-fi universe, including the Dr. Carlos tales and A. B. Carolan’s first three YA sci-fi mysteries? Rogue Planet is another one, and it has some Game-of-Throne aspects while still being hard sci-fi. A young prince’s planet is ruled by an oppressive theocracy that has led to a quarantine by ITUIP (Interstellar Trade Union of Independent Planets). He strives to defeat the theocracy’s leader and bring the planet back from the galaxy’s Dark Ages.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

[As a native son of the great state of California, I can emphasize with Irwin Pound’s sentiments found in this short novella (or long short story?). My distance from my current home in Montclair to California is farther than his distance from London to the Lake District, but the yearning is probably just as strong. I hope you enjoy this story, another British-style mystery.]

The Prodigal Son

Copyright 2021, Steven M. Moore

Chapter Four

The police substation was mostly dark except for the night sergeant’s post near the entrance and Toby’s desk in one corner of the main room.

“What do you have for me, lad?” Robert said to Toby, who looked no older than sixteen or so.

“James Talent is the victim’s name. He’s from Southampton. Popped up on a shipping company’s website’s personnel list. VP for that company, as a matter of fact.”

“What was he doing here so far north?”

“Tourist. Three weeks of vacation. Must be nice to have that.”

“I wish I did,” Irwin said. “And not the hard way like I got mine the hard way. Was he with his wife?”

“Not married.” Toby winked slyly at Irwin. “Doesn’t mean he didn’t have a lady friend along.”

“My, how children grow up fast these days,” said Robert, winking at Irwin. “Didn’t happen to see him at the inn, did you?”
“No, but that’s a good idea. We should check places around here where tourists might seek lodging. He had to be staying somewhere, and we now have a name as well as a picture.”

“Lots of places and lots of tourists this time of year.” Robert thought a moment. “We’ll make a list, ordered in some logical way—maybe customer rankings, seeing that Talent was a VIP and probably loaded—and divide them up between us. I hope you don’t mind. That’s why I brought you along. I’m a bit shorthanded. Toby, go home now. Time you get your beauty sleep, lad, and I don’t want your mum to kill me.”

Toby made a face but then nodded. “Yes, sir. Good luck.” He handed a photo to Irwin. “Please autograph this, sir.”

Irwin took the photo; it was of himself, probably from his Met file.

“Not often we get a DI from London up here, sir. I want to work in the Yard.”

Robert frowned; Irwin smiled. Why not? He signed at the bottom of the photo with his biro.

“I’ll work hard to discourage you from doing that, Toby.”

“Um, off with you, lad. And thanks for all your help.”

Robert watched the lad go and then eyed Irwin. “Nice of you to do that. He’s a clever fellow. Can’t hurt to encourage him, I suppose.”

“No, sir.”

“Stop calling me sir, damn it! Let’s get to work, Irwin. We need to make some progress on this case.”

They didn’t find any lodging having James Talent as guest. Irwin suggested that the tourist might have been staying with relatives and friends. Or using an assumed name. They became busy developing two more lists.

Monday would be a busy day.

Chapter Five

Monday afternoon, DS Tim Harding hit paydirt when he received a call. He rang Mills. The two DIs had dashed off all the way to Penrith to an upscale hotel where the clerk claimed to have a client matching Talent’s description. The local television channel had featured the story on the late Sunday and Monday morning’s news.

That person-of-interest had turned out to be a traveling pharmaceuticals salesman. Robert and Irwin jumped back in the car and headed back toward the police station. Fortunately the smaller hotel corresponding to Toby’s call was in the next village over from it, more like the inn where Irwin was staying, with only eight rooms and no pub.

When they arrived, they examined the check-in log after showing their warrant cards to the woman who ran the place. She seemed nervous, but, like the first establishment, she’d at least called in her doubts about the hotel’s guest who seemed to match the picture she’d seen on the tele.

“James Smythe? Sounds like an assumed name to me,” said Robert.

Irwin winked at the woman. “She saw past the name, sir.”

Robert glared at him. Irwin knew it was for calling him “sir.” But how can I not call him that? Even though they had the same rank, Irwin respected Robert, who long ago had admitted his mistake in arresting Irwin.

“Have you seen this bloke around here recently?” Robert asked the innkeeper.

“He’s still checked in.” She thought a moment. “I haven’t seen him on my shifts for the last few days, though. There are two clerks here when I can’t be. I can ask around if you like.”

“No, that’s okay. If it’s our victim, he won’t be around.”

She blanched. “He’s the murder victim?”

Irwin figured she hadn’t followed the story behind the picture. Perhaps the tele’s newscast hadn’t transmit all the information?  Young children? Trains? The inn wasn’t far from the small station either, but most trains wouldn’t stop, only tooting their whistles as they blew through the village.

“Probably,” Irwin said. “Can we see his room? Or do we need to find a judge to get a search order?”

“I own this place. I have a policy about visitors’ privacy, but in this case, we can ignore it. I can show you Mr. Smythe’s room.”

She rightly figures the warrant would waste her time as well as ours, thought Irwin. That would rarely happen in London.

“We’ll not disturb anything,” Mills said, “and we’ll ask you and your staff to stay out. If he’s our victim, mind you.”

“I hope that soon ends so I can rent out the room again.”

They followed the owner up to a small room on the third floor. “I’ll wait here on the landing,” she said after opening the door for them.

***

With powdered latex gloves and Teflon booties, Mills and Pound searched the room. Toiletries had no special interest for them, but Robert searched through the valise and larger suitcase while Irwin went through the clothes. Several handkerchiefs bore the monogram J.L.T. The surname didn’t match with Smythe obviously. He told Robert.

“Suitcases’ initials are J.L.T. too,” Robert said. “We’ll want to dust them for prints.” He then went through the little desk’s drawers and then the bin. “Here’s something: The name Sara followed by an address and phone number. No town indicated and the exchange could be anywhere in the area. A job for Toby, I’m thinking.”

“We’re a bit further along at least, inspector. That is, if Sara is our killer.”

“I think we can call in the constables and others helping with the search for now. Mr. Smythe is our victim. We now need to check out this address and phone number.”

“Perhaps he was up to no good,” Irwin said, “using an alias. Was he here to kill Sara? Or to blackmail her?”

“A VIP in a major shipping company? Sounds like a stretch. In any case, whoever it was, was angry enough to kill him.”

“He could be up to his ears in gambling debt. I had a case like that in London.”

“A murder case?”

“An attempted murder case. The target was the man the perpetrator owed money to.”

“Ha! Human weakness often rears its ugly head when money is involved. I suppose the prat was lying to his wife about it too.”

“No. He was a widower. Nasty bloke, though.”

“Can’t say the missus drove him to it then.” He glanced at the manager pacing in the corridor. “We’d better do a runner before she wears herself out.”

They thanked the manager and returned to Robert’s vehicle in the nearby car park.

Chapter Six

“Got it!” Toby said.

Tim Harding was soon looking over his shoulder. “Jot that down for me. I’ll take it to Mills and Pound.”

Tim was a bit nervous as he walked towards his superior’s office. It’d been bad enough working for the crusty old inspector; now he had to deal with two. Although Pound was nearer his age and less gruff, the two together made a demanding duo. Of course, Irwin was helping without being paid. Good of him to do so, but his help sidelines me a lot.

“Have a seat,” Irwin said as he entered Mills’s office.

“Got something, lad?” Robert said.

“Town’s Penrith where you were. Shall we call the number?”

Robert nodded. There was no answer. The inspector looked at his watch. “The missus signed me up for a mash fest in Windermere. Tim, go with Irwin and check out that address. Don’t hesitate to call me. I could use a good excuse to get out of high tea.”

“Will do,” Tim said, his mood brightening.

Irwin, feeling a bit sorry for Robert and his social life, climbed in besides Tim, who was already at the wheel of the patrol car. He saw himself in the young sergeant, an energetic fellow who was on his way up if life would be fair to him.

“I know the way,” he said. “I guess you do too.”

“People fished on the lake when I was young, but I was more into hiking. Go for it. Roads have changed, and all that. I’m a bit stressed, if you want to know the truth.”

“Didn’t count on being roped into an investigation, I imagine.”

“I’m supposed to be recovering from a previous one.” Tim pulled out into traffic.

Irwin saw the vehicle coming at them before Tim did. “Look out!”

The car crashed head-on, airbags deployed, and day turned into night.

***

“You’ll live, Irwin.”

He felt a hand pat his, but the voice seemed distant. Yet familiar? He opened his eyes to see Devon.

“What-what happened?”

“Someone crashed into your car. There were some witnesses who said a small man in a hoodie ran away from the scene, leaving the hire-car there. Coppers poured out of the station and pulled you two out before both cars caught fire.”

“Tim?”

“Banged up a bit more than you are. Broken arm and cuts on his face from windscreen shards.”

“I need to talk to him. Maybe he can describe the driver.”

“My uncle is with him now. You’re staying put until the physician clears you. Tim had a concussion, so you might also have one.”

Irwin moved a bit, looking for water on the nightstand. “I think I’m more dehydrated.”

“Maybe your mouth is dry, but you were on IV. I just disconnected you. If the doctor gives the okay, you can go. I’ll get some ice chips.”

She was gone only a moment when Robert showed up.

“Could Tim describe that crazy driver?” Irwin asked.

“Not very well. Said he looked like a young kid with a Man-U sweatshirt, hood and all. Fake name on the rental receipt.”

Irwin thought a moment. “A woman dressed like that might be mistaken for a kid.”

Robert raised his eyebrows. “I was writing it off as some kid out for a joyride in a stolen motor. I know what you’re thinking, but aren’t you being paranoid?”

“I’m helping on the investigation, and I am your only witness. That’s maybe two good reasons to try to kill me.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that. Let me check out this Sara person. That could sort things a bit.”

“Didn’t the rental clerk ask to see a driver’s permit?”

“Not even. And he might lose his job over that, poor prat.”

“I want to go with you then.”

“Where to?”

“Penrith. We need to find this Sara.”

Robert nodded. “I’ll ask the NHS pill-pusher if it’s okay. I’m going to get hell for having a civilian consultant on this case, so I might as well go all out.”

***

Comments are always welcome.

A. B. Carolan’s Origins. You can’t say A. B.’s novels are British-style mysteries; he’s Irish and he writes sci-fi mysteries for young adults. In this one, Kayla Jones has dreams she can’t understand. Her future seems determined as the brilliant STEM student who looks forward to a research career, but her past gets in the way. As if the chaos afflicting the world and leading to her adopted father’s death wasn’t enough, killers begin to pursue her. With some friends who come to her aid, she’s on her way to discover a conspiracy that can be traced to prehistoric battles waged by hominins bent on conquest of a primitive Earth.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Most readers of this blog and my recent works know that I’m surviving the Covid pandemic by reading a lot, in particular, binge-reading entire series of British-style mysteries. I published a list at the end of my little collection, Sleuthing, British-style, written in honor of Dame Agatha, who started that story tradition. So here are some additions to that list (in alphabetical order, which coincidentally corresponds to the order of light-to-serious themes), the best of my recent binge-reading:

A. G. Barnett’s “Mary Blake” series. Interesting concept: The subtitle’s character is an aging actor who has lost her series role and her career; she discovers she has talents as an amateur sleuth. A bit of stretch for the reader’s imagination, especially concerning the patience of the inspector she often annoys (she’s a younger, meddling Miss Marple), but entertaining stories nonetheless.

M. S. Morris’s “Bridget Hart” series. The subtitle’s character is a single mom who struggles to make her mark as a DI in and around the hallowed halls of Oxford University’s colleges. There are many secondary characters readers will find interesting.

Gretta Mulrooney’s “Tyrone Swift” series. Here the subtitle’s character is a PI who has good creds—he’s no amateur sleuth because of past service with the Met and Interpol. He also has problems with the women in his life. These novels are a bit darker about their treatment of more modern and serious themes than those above. The main character harks back to hard-boiled, tenacious PIs of yore.

If you use a Kindle, it’s amazingly easy to sail through these series, one book after another. I found each novel is far more entertaining than the summer’s offering of droll telly shows, whether “new” game shows or reality crap or reruns. Sorry. Streaming video doesn’t appeal to me either, nor do computer games. Each novel is good for two to three nights of reading (they’re short).

Modesty aside, I’ll not refrain from mentioning Books Four and Five in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, Palettes, Patriots and Prats and Leonardo and the Quantum Code. The influence of all that binge-reading is obvious as Esther and Bastiann return to her home turf after their honeymoon only to run into more trouble on UK soil. The glossary in my collection mentioned above is extended in these novels as I continue to adopt the British vernacular if not the spelling, (The entire series represents ripe fruit for binge-reading, of course, but the novels are longish and hardly readable in two or three nights. Maybe the five in total equal fifteen of the above?)

I can only wish for other extended series in the sci-fi and thriller genres (besides my own, of course). The last one I read in the first genre was Asimov’s extended Foundation series, and that was years ago! Clancy’s “Jack Ryan” series is also too dated (not that it has the caliber of any of the books I’ve mentioned). (If anyone shouts back “Fifty Shades,” I might become violent. The “thrills” there are sicker than a story about a serial killer!) The fact that there are so many British-style mysteries shows they’re popular and a blessing for avid readers who still prefer books to streaming video and computer games.

In all these British-style mysteries, including mine, American readers have a chance to learn a lot about their English cousins…and sometimes those cousins will have a chance to learn a bit about us, the crazy Yanks!

***

Comments are always welcome.

A. B. Carolan’s Origins. You can’t say A. B.’s novels are British-style mysteries; he’s Irish, and he writes sci-fi mysteries for young adults. In this one, Kayla Jones has dreams she can’t understand. Her future seems determined as the brilliant STEM student who looks forward to a research career, but her past gets in the way. As if the chaos afflicting the world and leading to her adopted father’s death wasn’t enough, killers begin to pursue her. With some friends who come to her aid, she’s on her way to discover a conspiracy that can be traced to prehistoric battles waged by hominins bent on conquest of a primitive Earth.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Surprise, surprise! Regular readers of this blog might be expecting to find a politically oriented op-ed here this Monday morn. You will now find these at Pub Progressive (for example, my Afghan series continues there). Future articles posted here will now be restricted to those dealing with reading, writing, and publishing. I hope that’s not an inconvenience.

I’m not doing this to appease some disgruntled readers or to follow the advice of writing gurus who tell authors “Don’t be political.” The world is very political now, and I’ve been political since the Gipper set out to destroy the UC system and wanted to go after all those pink-o commies protesting against the Vietnam War. (I was neither pink-o—lots of California sunshine back then—nor a commie, just a progressive and a pacifist.) I was a progressive long before the members of “The Squad” were born, but I was, and always will be, one led by logic and reason and very aware that exuberance can lead to unintended and negative consequences.

Readers of my novels know that I don’t shy away from political or controversial themes in my writing. My stories are complex; I don’t like to read fluff, and I won’t write it. But today that’s not enough. So I created the narrowly focused website Pub Progressive in order to do the same for my blog posts.

The major reason I did that, though, was to bring a bit of order into my writing life. Articles appearing at Pub Progressive are my political opinions, not rants, reasoned spiels about what’s going on in our nation and the world. Articles appearing here in this blog are also opinions, but ones about reading, writing, and publishing (I might rant about Amazon). It’s like having your winter clothes in one closet, summer ones in the other. (That might not make too much sense for those back in my home state, California.)

Pub Progressive is still a work-in-progress, a DIY project where I’m doing a deep dive into the murky software waters associated with WordPress blogging. I plan to keep it simple; I have to do so, because I’m no website guru. (I hire the people at Monkey C Media to keep this older website going.) I can use your comments and suggestions about improving Pub Progressive if they’re free and you are a website guru. (You can contact me via steve@stevenmmoore.com. Both sites’ contact pages use that email address.) Scientists usually like to tinker and experiment; I’m an ex-scientist, so that’s what I’m doing with Pub Progressive. Bear with me.

And again, I hope this causes no one inconvenience. For some, the separation will cause a sigh of relief. For others, they’ll say, “Way to go!” I hope you’re one of the others.

***

Comments are always welcome.

A. B. Carolan’s Origins. You can’t say A. B.’s novels are British-style mysteries; he’s Irish, and he writes sci-fi mysteries for young adults. In this one, Kayla Jones has dreams she can’t understand. Her future seems determined as the brilliant STEM student who looks forward to a research career, but her past gets in the way. As if the chaos afflicting the world and leading to her adopted father’s death wasn’t enough, killers begin to pursue her. With some friends who come to her aid, she’s on her way to discover a conspiracy that can be traced to prehistoric battles waged by hominins bent on conquest of a primitive Earth.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

[As a native son of the great state of California, I can empathize with Irwin Pound’s sentiments found in this short novella (or long short story?). The distance from my current home in Montclair to California is farther than his distance from London to the Lake District, but the yearning is probably just as strong. I hope you enjoy this story, another British-style mystery.]

The Prodigal Son

Copyright 2021, Steven M. Moore

Chapter One

Irwin looked up to see the woman who was calling his name. “Irwin? Irwin Pound?”

He put down his bacon roll, smiled when he recognized her, but still had to mimic her. “Devon? Devon Blake? Is that you?”

She held up a finger, turned to the cashier, and paid for her mash-up. She then joined him. She offered him a biscuit, which he accepted

“What brings you back home to the Lake District?” she said.

“A bit of vacation time. Super suggested it. Insisted on it, to be more precise. I decided to take it here to see how things have changed. It’s been a while.”

“I’ll say, donkey’s years. But you found that not much has changed, I wager.”

She was correct, except for her. Two years younger than Irwin, that difference was largely irrelevant now. Devon wasn’t a pimply and gangly teenager anymore. He’d been like her big, protective brother when they were children. Now pigtails and freckles had turned into dark red, lush curls and the freckles had faded, and she’d become a woman. A stunner at that, to his mind’s eye.

He was at a loss for how to begin a conversation. “How’s the family?”

“Papa’s passed on; mum’s ailing a bit. A natural progression, I suppose, but it makes me sad sometimes.”

“Better than losing them in an accident.”

He immediately regretted saying that. Her expression needed no words. A driver had killed Irwin’s parents in a hit-and-run. Irwin had gone to live with his aunt and uncle in London.

“Yes, that was terrible. Tell me about your life since then.”

He was thankful Devon didn’t reinforce those sad memories even more. He thought a moment but then opened up to her as he’d always done before when they were children, even telling her about nearly getting killed during his last case, the event that had led to his unplanned-for vacation.

She’d always been a good listener, and he had always liked doing that for her too. So he learned she was now a nurse and had put all those skills to good use while also caring for her mum.

***

Irwin bid farewell with a promise to keep in touch followed by a hug and kiss to her cheek. He went off to begin his hike. Although “home” was in the Lake District, he’d always preferred hiking in Cumbria’s hills and mountains to fishing. His climb that day was one he’d mastered when he was fourteen. It wasn’t for amateurs, and he was a bit out of practice. His kit contained plenty of rope, pickaxe, hammer, and pylons; his old hiking boots helped to grip rock ledges slippery with mist and moss.

It turned out he only needed the boots. There was still a trail of sorts above the pub’s little village that he’d known well and still could envision in his mind. He headed for his favorite place, an outlook where you could sometimes see from west to east coast if faraway clouds didn’t shroud one or the other. There was another outlook about three hundred feet below him, but his special place offered the better view. He felt he could touch the sky as well. A complete panorama revealing some of Gaia’s magnificence.

He’d been there almost an hour enjoying the nearly forgotten vista when a sound behind him was a surprise at that desolate spot where few hikers ventured. He turned to see Devon scrambling onto the ledge. He offered her a hand up to complete her climb.

“There was a time when I’d have prohibited you from making such a dangerous climb,” he said, mitigating his reproach with a smile because he was happy to see her and have her share his view. “We could have come together, you know.”

She laughed. “I wanted to prove to you I can do it alone now. I’ve been making this climb for a while.”

“Without mum’s approval, I’d wager. She never liked my climbing and discouraged you from doing it too. Maybe the reason I discouraged you?”

“She was only worried that she’ll never have any grandchildren; still is. Always afraid too that I’ll catch some terrible disease at the hospital, even though she benefits from my nursing skills. I come here from time to time to get away from her, truth be told. I can’t afford a nurse for her, so I’m that person, like I said at the pub. A few neighbors help at times with her. And she sometimes visits an aunt and uncle on my father’s side.”

He nodded. Both her occupation and her dedication to her mother were evidence of a very caring person. “I suppose—”

***

Irwin was interrupted by a heated exchange of words from below them. Devon and he looked over the edge at the barney going on between a man and a woman. The man was older, a bit jowly and with bushy eyebrows; his face was beet red. They could only see the backside of the woman. She had straight red hair, not curled like Devon’s.

Both of them were dressed in hiking gear that might as well have had the price tags still on. Perhaps amateur twitchers, thought Irwin, spotting the man’s binoculars that swung on the strap around his neck. Around Cumbrian lakes and rivers and in the hills and mountains one could often spot birds not found anywhere else in England.

“I will not do that! No way!” Irwin heard the woman say. She then pushed the man over the edge.

“Oh my God!” Devon said.

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I used to like motorcycles. Even back in my tweens and teens, my mother would say, “Any motorcycle rider should be forced to sign up to be an organ donor.” She worried about the danger; I yearned to have enough money to buy one. I was a frustrated kid, seeing other boys having fun on their motorcycles yet knowing that I didn’t even have the money for a scooter. So I was relegated to being the guy on the back, a position useful for a drive-by assassin maybe, but never the fun ride one has up front. I suppose riding a horse might be a similar experience—wind in your hair, reveling in the sensation of speed—but even back then a horse cost more than a cycle.

Motorcycles don’t make many appearances in my stories, though. The terrorist’s night ride in Angels Need Not Apply provided a quiet and sinister hook—I hoped the reader would be wondering, “Who is this guy?” (they might have guessed if they’d read The Midas Bomb). Penny Castro’s brief ride along a post-apocalyptic LA freeway even made it to the cover of The Last Humans, and I hope the Hungarian assassin’s final ride in Leonardo and the Quantum Code provides an interesting climax for readers. Those reflect more my pubescent interest than any desire to make a cycle a main character, and I’d never want to encourage the risky, outrageous behavior seen in Sturgis, South Dakota, each year, Covid or no Covid.

Motorcars, or simply “motors,” is Brit-speak for automobiles, or “autos” (although the Brits say “car park” for “parking lot,” that usually have spaces for cycles too). My fascination with them isn’t so juvenile as the one with motorcycles and doesn’t compare with that or my brother’s strange predilection for unusual cars. He started with a ’52 Pontiac (a “blue bomb” that I inherited to use during high school) and went on to a pink Cadillac (a model with shark fins he bought from a Las Vegas gambler), the kind you saw in that famous X-Files episode; his last unusual purchase was a classic Porsche, the one with wooden floorboards, in which he carried grandfather’s guns to me from Ohio to Massachusetts. (I sold them to a gun collector—our kids were too young at the time to have guns around, especially antiques, and I didn’t want to deal with any NRA members.)

Maybe the little sportscar in Silicon Slummin’…and Just Gettin’ By and Esther’s Jag in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series (her insurance pays for a new one in Palettes, Patriots, and Prats) are the cars I remember best from my novels, maybe because they’re the most recent; but a ’67 Vette plays a key role in one early short story “The Bridge.” (It’s my first and only zombie story and first appeared in eFiction, an ezine that’s now defunct, I believe, and also in Pasodobles in a Quantum Stringscape, Volume One—Volumes Two and Three can be found in the list of free downloads on my “Free Stuff & Contests” web page.)

Curiously enough in my prose, I’ve avoided the stereotype that male characters ride motorcycles and female ones drive motorcars, as you can see by some of the examples I’ve mentioned. The same is true about horses: A female character in The Collector frequents a stable in that story, while Survivors of the Chaos (see The Chaos Chronicles Trilogy Collection) opens with a solitary male rider. Horses as a ubiquitous mode of transportation even make a comeback in the post-apocalyptic thriller The Last Humans: A New Dawn (Penny Castro’s cycle is long gone by this second novel). NYPD detective Castilblanco (that’s NYC, in case you didn’t know!) even befriends a horse in the short story “The Case of Carriageless Horse” (found in the anthology World Enough and Crime—it’s the young cop’s first homicide case).

Horses have the longest history as a means of transportation for human beings, of course. Maybe I should feature them even more? After that fiasco at this year’s Kentucky Derby, one can imagine a murder mystery with a racetrack setting. We’ll see….

***

Comments are welcome.

Sleuthing, British-Style. My binge-reading of British-style mysteries during the Covid pandemic has influenced the later novels in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, in particular Death on the Danube, Palettes, Patriots, and Prats, and Leonardo and the Quantum Code. I’ve also written short fiction to honor and celebrate Dame Agatha’s seminal work in this subgenre. Some examples are found in the little collection indicated here of six novellas, which also contains a glossary of words and phrases from the UK’s rich lexicon of dialects as well a list of British-style novels that I read and enjoyed. The collection is available wherever quality ebooks are sold (but not on Smashwords). A second volume is available as a free download (see the “Free Stuff & Contests” web page at this website).

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

Starting 8/24/2021 (today), op-eds with a political orientation will exclusively be posted on my second blog, Pub Progressive. The same rules of engagement apply (see the ROEs on the “Join the Conversation” web page), but this site’s blog will now focus on reading, writing, and publishing topics. This might upset some readers and authors; others might breathe a sigh of relief.

Authors do have opinions. Maybe it’s better that they just creep into their prose as important themes? I don’t know. I certainly don’t do fluff, and my characters often express opinions contrary to my own. Editors and publishers certainly prefer that fiction authors aren’t opiniated, so that biases modern prose toward fluff.

In any case, this is an experiment. At the very least, it will help me keep things organized.

So…reading, writing, and reading topics are found at this site’s blog, and politically oriented op-eds at Pub Progressive.

Note: Yesterday’s post about Afghanistan is definitely a political op-ed. It will be repeated on the new website. (That will be the last time.)

Let’s face it: The evacuation from Afghanistan is another “Saigon moment.” But does Biden own it? Multiple presidents have committed blunders there. He’s just joined that gang. I want to go through this dark stretch of American history a bit here. It’s longer than you might remember.

Most people have forgotten the reasons why we were there, especially anyone under forty. “Wait!” you say. “9/11 occurred in 2001, only twenty years ago.” The frustration leading to the current evacuation (supposedly to be completed by August 31) didn’t begin with 9/11. That frustration began long ago and reflects four decades of failed Middle East foreign policy created by numerous US presidents. But the Biden administration’s evacuation will go down in history as the worst since Vietnam.

So I’ll answer that all-too-common reaction springing from the myopic memories of clueless Americans (that group obviously includes Biden and his aides in State and Defense, of course) with a series of what-ifs that summarize the mistakes that have been made.

What if the Russians hadn’t stood up a puppet government in Afghanistan? Sometime ago, “back in the USSR…you don’t know how [un]lucky you are, boy,” Leonid Brezhnev, the Kremlin’s capo back then, wanted to move into the Middle East to have more influence in the Third World (even Israel was in the Third World at the time). They first tried Egypt and that failed (Jimmy Carter got Egypt and Israel to sign a peace accord that has held despite all subsequent problems and recalcitrant Arab and Israeli governments). So old jowly Leonid tried his despotic magic on Afghanistan. The Russians smashed the Taliban tribes and stood up a caretaker government, a puppet of the USSR. Al Qaeda fought back, and the CIA thought they’d be clever and turn Afghanistan into the USSR’s Vietnam by arming al Qaeda terrorists and their Taliban friends. The USSR left in disgrace (it was indeed their first Vietnam moment—the Chechnyan Wars soon followed), but al Qaeda was now entrenched, the Taliban had a resurgence, and the two groups became the best of buddies, with the Taliban protecting al Qaeda and allowing them to plot 9/11. This is only a summary of a lot of bad history for the US, of course, but it all occurred before 9/11.

What if we’d gone into Afghanistan after 9/11 to hunt al Qaeda down and then left when we succeeded? Revenge is sweet, so they say, so the US wanted to taste it against bin Laden and his terrorists (mostly Saudis, by the way, and financed by Saudi Arabia, a country that probably financed the Taliban as well…all to promote radical Islam). We chased al Qaeda out of Afghanistan and eventually gave bin Laden what he deserved. Even before bin Laden’s demise, we should have ended our presence in Afghanistan. But no, we stayed. Why? In spite of Dubya’s focus on Iraq, that old nation-building dream that too many nations have tried in the Middle East, Africa, and even southern Europe (the old Yugoslavia), vocalized or not, kept us there. (The only notable success of this policy is Israel—sort of—some would say it’s also become a fascist failure in its turn to fascism.)

In the Middle East, we think we can create democracies and stable governments out of desert mirages where there are no traditions to serve as a foundation. History has shown many times over that citizens of a country have to rise up on their own. (That’s how the USSR eventually crumbled! A desire for freedom and a better life toppled the old Soviet Union, not Carter, Reagan, or any other American leader. Lamentably that desire wasn’t strong enough there, so Putin could take over and make things worse.) Nation-building can’t work if the people themselves don’t want to build a nation…or don’t give a damn, preferring autocracy. The Afghan army did not have the will to fight the Taliban at the beginning of the century; with all the billions spent on equipment and training for them, they still didn’t have it in 2021.

What if Biden had learned from Bush, Obama, and Trump’s mistakes and hadn’t wanted to out-trump Trump? For the last, I’m guessing here, but it sure looks like one of old Joe’s major motivations. He could have done a one-eighty relative to Trump’s meddling in Afghanistan (he did so for many other Trump idiocies), but chose not too, because, unlike Obama who fantasized about a new nation in Afghanistan, Biden wanted to get out of that hellhole. Most Americans agreed with that. Few agree with how the Biden administration went about doing it.

But here’s the rest of the sordid tale: The US tried nation-building in Iraq after Dubya decided to avenge Daddy Bush and correct the latter’s huge error of not marching all the way into Baghdad once and for all as a fitting end to the Gulf War. Obama then left Iraq, and the US got ISIS. ISIS was beaten down with the help of the Kurds, but Trump pulled out of Iraq again, leaving our Kurdish friends behind to be slaughtered by the fascist Erdogan. Now old Joe pulls out of Afghanistan, leaving our Afghan friends behind to suffer the same merciless fate at the hands of the Taliban, who make Erdogan look like a saint.

Okay, maybe old Joe was too senile to learn from Bush and Trump’s mistakes, but he was right there when Obama made the mistake that created ISIS. I guess you can’t teach old dogs new tricks, whether or not they’re senile. Biden was focused on just getting out; he forgot to have a reasonable plan about how to do it. Or his administration did. Not only has Biden turned Afghanistan into yet another Vietnam, continuing America’s string of foreign policy failures and America’s fall into international irrelevance, he’s leaving behind many of our Afghan friends to horribly die just like Trump did with the Kurds.

This is why I give Biden an F on his report card for Afghanistan. Yes, we should have left Afghanistan…years ago! And, especially now, it should have been a well-planned withdrawal. It wasn’t by any stretch of the imagination. But there’s a lot of people to spread the blame around: the CIA, several presidents, and a whole bunch of myopic fools in State and Defense who should have known better and told Biden so. They, and the American people, for that matter, forgot the debacle in Vietnam. We have abandoned trusted friends who aided us to realize our dreams about nation-building, dreams that inevitably have turned into nightmares.

The Taliban will mercilessly slaughter our Afghan friends. That blood is on Biden’s hands! I hope he can’t sleep at night thinking about it. There’s a special place in his Catholic hell for mass murderers like him. Beating the Donald to the punch—or even feeling constrained to continue Il Duce’s initiatives—hardly justifies his failures. Nothing does.

***

Comments are always welcome.

Sleuthing, British-Style. My binge-reading of British-style mysteries during the Covid pandemic has influenced the later novels in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series, in particular Death on the Danube, Palettes, Patriots, and Prats, and Leonardo and the Quantum Code. I’ve also written short fiction to honor and celebrate Dame Agatha’s seminal work in this subgenre. Some examples are found in the little collection indicated here–six short novellas–which also contains a glossary of words and phrases from the UK’s rich lexicon of dialects as well a list of British-style novels that I’ve read and enjoyed. The collection is available wherever quality ebooks are sold (but not on Smashwords). A second volume is available as a free download (see the “Free Stuff & Contests” web page at this website).

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

[Note: This series will focus entirely on combatting fascism in America and around the world with my only weapon, words. (I’m not an NRA member!) It’s not antifa per se; it’s pro democracy. If you recognize words blasting your political preferences here, you’re part of the problem! To the rest of you, don’t worry about me. The fascist plutocracy of the 0.1% doesn’t do their own dirty work; and their toadies who do, don’t read very much, like their lord and savior, Donald J. Trump. So I doubt these essays will even hurt my book sales, mostly because that same plutocracy has already determined they will be low!]

Let’s get one thing straight: America’s potentially fatal sickness doesn’t depend on semantics; the words used to describe it are irrelevant. How the fascist plutocracy treats the sick patient is what’s terribly wrong and un-American. Differences between “fascism” and other names for the sickness are akin to the difference between “flatulence” and “fart”: both words describe a stench. America is no longer a democracy or republic—it’s a country where a fearful plutocracy does its best to ensure that it survives so they can become richer at the expense of the rest of us. Wealth distribution in America is the worst it has been during its previous history. You might call it “us vs. them,” but it’s really more “plutocracy vs. the common people.” It is in that sense that we now have the Fascist States of America.

I’ve discovered a little book (ooh, maybe a second book review this week?) that makes many of the points I’ve made in this series, probably doing it better than I have…except for semantics. Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson in Let Them Eat Tweets use the term “plutocratic populism” for “fascism.” I don’t understand why so many like them are afraid of the word fascism. I started this series with part of Wikipedia’s definition: “Fascism is a form of far-right, authoritarian ultra-nationalism characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and of the economy….” That’s plutocratic populism as defined by those authors. Let’s not sugarcoat it by avoiding the word fascism.

Otherwise, I have to give credit where credit is due: Those authors have analyzed the hell out of our current conundrum, the turn to fascism in America driven by s plutocracy that uses the tools of outmoded institutions of American government and exploits fanatics who believe they’ve been stepped on (they have been, but by the plutocracy and their serfs, the Good Ole Piranhas). These fanatics are generally white males, who are uneducated, blue collar or rural, and religious to the extreme. They have been left behind and are unprepared for existence in the modern world, and they’re stupid enough to drink the plutocracy’s Kool-Aid.

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