One Day Special FREE: Area Study Workbook and New York City Little Black
For today, 1 March, both these books are free for the first time on my Freebies page.
I’m making the Area Study Guide free because I feel it’s an extremely important book. From events like the train derailment in Ohio to winter storms to power outages to drought, doing an Area Study can make you better prepared to face them. My wife and I are looking to move and I’m doing Area Studies for locations all over the country to consider both the immediate and future threats in the area.
An Area Study is what we did in Special Forces prior to deploying to any part of the world. One of the annexes of the book is the Area Study I did of where we currently live and despite having been here for years, it was a real eye-opener. You can have a lot of fun with your family doing one.
New York City Little Black Book was more a labor of love for the city I grew up in. Lots of facts and history I didn’t know. It also has useful information if you ever visit the place, such as how the subway maps work. Lots of fascinating tibits and an easy read.
If you do download and take a look, please leave a review.
Of course, there are other freebies today, such as The Jefferson Allegiance, one of my favorites as it accurately predicted the Constitutional crises we are going through. My premise was that Jefferson and Hamilton were smart enough to know what could happen and prepared a secret document, The Jefferson Allegiance, to handle it. There’s also Three Special Operations books in one bundle at a steep discount, or free is you have Kindle Unlimited.
I’ve been watching 1923 and just wrote a post about Waiting for Spencer, because, well, you’ll have to read it to see what I think.
Jenny Crusie and I will make a decision shortly on what we’re going to do with the Liz Danger trilogy and I’ll send out a newsletter once that’s done.
I hope everyone is making it through the crazy weather.
Stay safe and stay happy!
Bob
1923: Waiting On Spencer
With multiple plot lines running in 1923, one constant is the epic “waiting on Spencer” to come back home so they can fight for their ranch.
Why? What’s so special about Spencer? He’s on the other side of the world. Is there no one halfway competent there? I know Dutton got hit by NINE—count ‘em—NINE .45 slugs and it put him out of action for a little while, but still. Is everyone else totally incompetent?
Because here’s the thing. Spencer seems to be a very incompetent boob. Not the kind of guy I’d be waiting on to lead me to victory.
First, his car gets knocked over by elephants, despite him being a savvy big game hunter. Then he gets treed by lions. Oh wait, before that, he was hired to kill a leopard but failed in that because he finds out too late there are two leopards and a woman and one of his guides gets killed. Not the big bad hunter he pretends to be. Didn’t he check tracks? Doesn’t he know big game and predators as the biggest, baddest hunter around?
Then he never bothers to read his mail anyway, so what good does it do to contact him?
When he finally deigns to check the mail via his newfound squeeze, who ran away from her own commitments, he makes for home. But, of course, the boat he’s on gets rammed by a derelict boat they’d spent the entire night steaming away from after going by it the first time and barely missing it because I don’t know. Were they going in a circle? I’m confused. Another screw up and this one is like, really? Big ocean, two boats, and they collide. What are they in, the US Navy?
They almost get eaten by sharks. Then they get rescued. Get married via the nicest captain you’re ever going to meet. Then finally get on a civilized boat but despite knowing they should hide out in their rather swank cabin (the only cruise I’ve been on was the Maui Writers Conference cruise and my shared room was the size of a closet and in the crew quarters—I know that because we got the announcement sent to the crew). Nope. They’re not going to be happy with cabin service and constant boinking each other. They decide to dress up and show off in front of her ex-fiancé’s family. Because, hey, that’s going to go well. It’s also called being a dick. And stupid. I’m questioning this guy’s decision-making because every decision he’s made so far has been wrong.
And, of course, Spencer, who is the guy we’re waiting on to save us, ends up banished off the boat. Because showing off was more important than getting home and saving his family and land.
And, up to this point, it seems his new wife never exactly asked him where they were going because she has to dramatically scramble to find one of the letters and read the return address (which she never noticed before, I guess, even though she read all of them to him) and scream “I’ll meet you in Bozeman!” as she finally wakes up to the destination. Her and Guffman.
And really, in a world where every actor seems to be English, they hire an American to play an English woman? Really? Her accent is all over the place. As are her emotions. I’m thinking they must be writing her to be borderline, right?
So far the show has been every character making the most selfish and stupid decision they can make and then seeing what happens. Harrison Ford started out, by being unredeemable for not even hanging those guys directly, but torturing them first. That entire scene made ZERO sense but it set in motion everything afterward so I hope they do lose the ranch and everything. They deserve to for being sadistic jerks.
No one is empathetic. The young Native American girl had to kill those nuns before leaving– how many more lives did that end and destroy? Why didn’t she just go?
There’s a lot of revenge in these shows. I get it. A lot of revenge in thrillers. I’m not a fan of revenge. Because in reality, revenge puts you on level with, if not below, those you seek revenge on.
I’m not saying 1923 badly written. It’s well-written in many ways. But at the core is profound narcissism. The same is true of Yellowstone. Appears to a winning formula.
But I’m not waiting on Spencer.
FALL; a Movie Review— how much reality are we expected to ignore?
Let me start by saying this is an entertaining movie. And it was very successful given its budget of 3 million. And kudos to the actresses. And worth watching just for the twists and turns in the action.
It’s about two women who climb a 2,000 foot radio tower and once they get to the top the last section of ladder they used falls away trapping them.
But you must be willing to suspend a LOT of disbelief at a number of basic flaws in the action. And have empathy with people who do stupid things for the rush and publicity.
Spoilers ahead.
It’s billed as a “survival” movie yet the two women do so many fundamental things wrong, starting with the basic “tell someone where you’re going and when you expect to be back”. That is an ironclad rule of basic survival. Basic camping. Basic hiking. Guess they never saw the movie about the guy who got trapped with the boulder crushing his arm and having to amputate it (127 Hours)? Hell, they didn’t carry a bone saw. Or even a Leatherman.
Plus, she did post to her thousands of followers from the base of the tower with her plan to climb it. Then simply disappeared for a couple of days. No one wondered?
Actually, the opening scene where the boyfriend falls to his death violated a rule of climbing— always have two pieces of protection in place. The first thing I did when I arrived at 10th Special Forces Group was going through International Mountain Climbing School where I learned enough never to want to climb a mountain for “fun” again. Pay and mission, yes. Sort of the way I feel about parachuting despite triple-digit jumps and being a jump master.
But, okay, they were kind of stupid anyway, so yeah, his one piece of protection failed. I knew it was inevitable that it would be revealed he’d slept with both of them. He was a guy. He was dead. Sure. Let’s throw that in. As if they didn’t have enough problems. “You slept with my boyfriend? Really, bitch?”
I had to blink when they got to the top of the 2,000 foot tower and said they had no cell phone signal even though they’d had one on the ground at the base of the tower. “We’re too high for a signal”. What???? I mean they even put cell phone transmitters ON TOP OF TOWERS! WTF??
I know that was necessary for the plot, but come on. You can drive an entire plot through that plot hole.
And let’s not talk battery life on the phones. They were concerned about the drone’s battery life, but those phones lasted forever and they wasted a lot of power on dumb things like pictures of better days. What about SOS using the flashlight at night?
The recharging of the drone using the light at the top? First, the scene in the diner was dumb. Really, a waitress isn’t going to let you plug in to charge your phone? Second, if the lamp was plugged in, why not use THAT plug? I don’t even know if you can actually charge a cell phone using a light socket. And I’m not going to try. Unless a waitress tells me I can’t use the plug. In which case, I’m not tipping.
But I do know the warning light at the top of a 2,000 foot tower IS NOT running off 110 volt. There’s some serious juice up there. I mean, come on? What might have been smart, if they were going to climb to that light, is disable it the first night. Don’t you think some people might notice that lack? Then use the flashlights on their cell phones?
Then the one actress hanging up there by her arms to charge the drone to four bars, really? Every try to hang like that?
There were little things like when the ladder went and the one woman fell, the other held on to the pole with one hand and managed to stop her fall. Sorry. Nope. No one’s grip is that strong. I’m sure people who are climbers were screaming at the screen many times during this movie, much like ex-military at action movies. In a way, this was the John Wick of mountain climbing.
Here’s the real kicker. They had a decent length of rope with them after the ladder fell. There are versions of a Prusick knot, that you can use to tighten down on a rod (or pole) and alternately tighten and loosen. It’s one of the basic knots of mountaineering. They had more than enough rope for each of them use such a knot (actually two for each) to climb down.
Honestly, I’d have a hard time tying a Prusick from memory. Which is why I have a downloaded knot-tying app on my cell phone. Along with a knot-tying book. Downloaded. So I don’t need the signal at 2,000 feet to access. PS: I have a list of free and cheap sruvvial Apps and books I highly recommend on my website.
In summation, back to the beginning. Entertaining. Worth watching. Don’t get mad at me. I’m just trying to keep people grounded in the reality of survival. And tower climbing.
Review: Poker Face is entertaining, but . . .
The first episode of #Pokerface sets up the premise of the series and sets the protagonist in motion so she can go to various places while being chased.
We have the set up of an over-arcing plot and individual episodes that can be watched on their own. They even pay homage to Burn Notice in the dialogue, which was cute.
I found it fun, but had two serious problems with the episode. Spoilers ahead.
First, if you’re going to plant multiple secret cameras in a room you pretty much negate the need for “Poker Face”. Just set them so they can look at the guy’s cards. They tried getting around that half-heartedly with saying he always sits with his back to the glass door to the terrace. But, really, you can’t put those same cameras in the ceiling above that door or even out on the terrace looking in. It just jarred me that it seemed the plan was dumb. Then again, the character coming up with the plan was dumb, so . . .
Second, when “Poker Face” confronts the bad guy, Frost, how did she expect that to play out? She isolates herself in a room with the antagonist and his henchman who she knows killed two people and she then shows them proof of their guilt. And then? Did she expect them to call the police and surrender? How exactly was that going to turn out well?
Then again, as above, even she says she’d kind of dumb about things.
Here is what’s difficult to do as a writer. Those two things work when you accept the two characters are making these bad choices. Not you, the screenwriter. Wrap your brain around that.
So Poker Face is fun entertainment with dumb choices being made.
SAS Rogue Heroes Review: Surprisingly Accurate
This series from the BBC and on Epix is amazingly true to history, although you might not believe it when you watch it. At the beginning is the blurb “based on a true story“, and that “the events depicted which seem most unbelievable… are mostly true“.
And that’s accurate. I knew a lot of the history of the founding of the SAS but still had to occasionally double-check and yes, those most crazy moments are true.
It’s from the creator of Peaky Blinders which had its ups and down but overall was a solid series. I think this is better.
There are several moments that will click with any special operator. I was pleasantly surprised watching the first season because special operations tend to get blurred into some sort of James Bond thing of super-human creatures with no humanity or flaws. These men are definitely human, warts and all. But we also recognize those we served with who had more than a few screws loose, but are exactly what you want in this type of unit.
Dominic West appears every so often as the twisted British spy master in Cairo. The rest of the cast is excellent, but be warned. Due to the real, bloody history, don’t grow attached to any character. They are all expendedable.
There are times when the series get very deep into the psyche of soldiers who do terrible things. Because it is war and war is terrible. William Tecumseh Sherman would approve.
Recommended.
A Year After Kennedy Was Killed, His Mistress Was Murdered. The Next Day, Khrushchev Resigned.
I love writing fiction that finds amazing fact and “coincidences” of history and weaves them together into a thriller. These are facts:
On the 25th of November, as Kennedy’s body lay in state at the Rotunda in Washington, Anastas Mikyoan, Khrushchev’s top adviser, presented the Premier’s condolences to Jacqueline Kennedy. She took Mikoyan’s hand in both hers and told him: “I am sure that Chairman Khrushchev and my husband could have been successful in the search for peace, and they were really striving for that. Now the Chairman must continue the agreed upon endeavor and bring it to completion.”
What was that endeavor?
On 12 October 1964, a Washington socialite named Mary Meyer was shot in the back of the head and through the heart at point-blank range. She had been married to a high-ranking CIA agent. More importantly, she had been carrying on an affair with President John F. Kennedy and was one of his most trusted friends, at his side through the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile Crisis.
On 13 October 1964, the day after Mary Meyer’s murder, the Soviet Politburo forced Nikita Khrushchev to resign from power and put him under house arrest.
“Today, every inhabitant of this planet must contemplate the day when this planet may no longer be habitable. Every man, woman and child lives under a nuclear Sword of Damocles, hanging by the slenderest of threads, capable of being cut at any moment by accident or miscalculation or by madness. The weapons of war must be abolished before they abolish us.” John F. Kennedy
Today, Paul Ducharme and Evie Tolliver unveil a Fail-Safe type scenario brokered by President Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev, lost to history, and race against time before the archaic Sword of Damocles initiates World War III.
For a thriller steeped in history, enjoy The Kennedy Endeavor, part of the Presidential Series.
Warfare To The Virtual Level: Based On A Real Program In Special Operations
When I was with the 10th Special Forces we initiated a program initially called, believe it or not, Jedi Warrior. That was changed to Trojan Warrior, as the Trojan Horse is part of a unit crest and perhaps because someone objected to copyright infringement?
It was a program to make a better soldier out of already elite Special Forces soldiers. Two A-Teams were selected for the training. My A-Team had the misfortune of being selected not to get the training, but to do all the same testing as the baseline to see if the program actually worked.
The movie Men Who Stare At Goats was partially based on the same program.
As an author, I can take fact and spin it into fiction so I wondered what would the next evolution of the Trojan Warrior program be?
Psychic Warrior is the result.
The Russians sink the submarine USS Thresher in 1963 using their classified psychic project, but something goes awry and all are killed. Except one scientist who plans to take the project to a higher level. Decades later, the Russians unleash Chyort, also known as the ‘Devil’. Chyort is a cyborg that can project into the virtual world with almost limitless power and reassemble his avatar anywhere in real world to wreak havoc. When the Russian mafia steals 20 nuclear warheads to auction them to the highest bidder, Chyort implements his own plan of revenge.
Sergeant Major Jimmy Dalton and a small team of US Green Berets who were originally trained in the classified Trojan Warrior program are thrust into the Psychic Warrior program. The team must battle the Russian avatar on the virtual plane and then take their own avatars into the real world. Their mission seems simple. Stop Chyort. If they fail? World War III.
Psychic Warrior takes warfare into the virtual plane through avatars and then reinserts the covert operatives into the real world. The results can be devastating. I use my real military experience in the then-classified Special Forces Trojan Warrior program and wrote a novel about the new frontier of warfare: the mind.
If you notice, many of my books are about the possibilities of the frontier of the mind.
This is the future of Special Operations Warfare.
A nice review from Library Journal: “A heart-pounding thriller about the emergence of a deadly avatar. The panorama of modern warfare and the details of hand-to-hand combat encounters add excitement. Inventive, entertaining, and realistic adventure. Highly recommended.”
Enjoy! Psychic Warrior
Which is free today through Tuesday, 10 January!
Slow Horses: Classic Spy Versus Spy. A Review
Gary Oldman reprises his Smiley character, albeit with a different name and a different time, in the series Slow Horses.
The title refers to the rejects from MI-5 who are shuffled off to Oldman’s supervision in Slough House, an old building where they are given the jobs no one else wants and also are used in others machinations in order to take the fall for their more elite brethren.
Strong characters and twists and turns in the plot make for enjoyable viewing. Oldman brings humor and snark to his character to make a dark story, where deaths along the way are taken in stride, to make it enjoyable.
The power plays with Kristin Scott Thomas as the #2 chair at MI-5 show spy bureaucracy at its worst. And best. Oldman’s character, Jackson Lamb, is a legend in MI-5 and he more than holds his own with her.
If you are into the devious nature of a good espionage story with a dash of action thrown in, this series is highly recommended.
Start the New Year Out Right—Biggest Sale ever from Bob Mayer
I’ve got a lot of free and discounted books—the most ever, but let’s focus on what your priorities should be for 2023.
First, real basic, get 2 cases of water per person in your household and stick them somewhere dark and dry. We’re seeing water shortages from a dizzying array of events, no one is safe.
Second, I’d recommend a basic grab-n-go bag. You can build your own using my Survival Guide, or a free slideshow, or simply buy a prepackaged one from Amazon. This is the one I bought for my son and he has it in the trunk of his car. Remember, it can help you get through a disaster in your house or on the road. The Area Study Workbook is free today and it will help you fine tune a kit if you want to build a personalized one.
Doing those two things will help you have peace of mind because you prepare for three reasons:
- To be prepared if the bad thing happens.
- To prevent the bad thing from happening.
- To have peace of mind.
Now the free and discounted books on this PAGE:
Shane and the Hitwoman is free until the 5th
Synbat (The Green Berets) is free until the 2nd.
The Green Beret Area Study Workbook is only .99 or kindle unlimited until the 5th
The Green Beret Guide for Success is free until the 5th
Atlantis Bermuda Triangle is free until the 5th
Nine-Eleven (Time Patrol) is .99 or kindle unlimited until the 5th
Military Science Fiction bundle is $1.99 or kindle unlimited until the 5th
Nightstalkers is $1.99 or kindle unlimited all month
Black Tuesday (Time Patrol) is $1.99 or kindle unlimited all month
Eyes of the Hammer (Green Berets) is always free
Duty (first book in Duty, Honor, Countt series) is always free
Whew. Okay. That’s plenty to get you started on 2023.
Al books HERE.
Stay healthy and stay safe!
Bob
And Maggie and Scout
Am I the Only Person Who Didn’t Care For Andor?
As a caveat, I’ve never been into the Star Wars universe. Saw the first one in 1977 and I think that’s it. I enjoyed it but I was 17, about to go to West Point. My life got blurry after that. I saw bits and pieces of the various follow-on movies, but none really grabbed me.
It’s entertainment that doesn’t make you think. Mind candy. Then there were prequels and sequels and who knows what. The first one is now what, number 4?
Everyone has been raving about this new series, a prequel to a prequel movie(??), Andor, so I tried it. I gave up around episode 5.
Why, you ask? Okay, you didn’t. But anyway:
First, the antagonist is a cold-blooded murderer in Episode 1. I guess we’re just supposed to be black and white about bad guys and good guys but he shoots an unarmed person begging for his life so he can escape. What do you call it? One man’s freedom fighter is another man’s terrorist.
And his acting range is from scowling to more scowling. And walking around in the mud with lots of extras in the background and a grim looking industrial background. Like Louisiana around the oil industry?
Second, the plot moves so SLOWLY. He’s looking for his sister. Why now? What’s he been doing all these years? He needs to run and hide because he, oh no, killed two people, while looking for his sister. One accidently and one in cold blood. I guess he did that to hide his identity. BTW—they don’t have any version of CCTV on that walkway to where the ships land. Or anywhere? And it doesn’t matter anyway because they figure out who he is quickly anyway. So that was a needless death. But it’s okay to kill bad guys which is anyone working for the Empire, even on contract?
The dichotomy between the supposedly advanced interstellar civilization that interacts with aliens and the clunkiness of the technology is jarring to me. If those guns are firing plasma, whatever kind of bolts at the speed of light, how can we see them? Ever see a bullet in flight?
They always miss, btw. It appears to be a staple of Star Wars that no bad guy can hit a good guy. I noticed one bad guy with a long scope on his blaster, but he never looks through the scope when firing. And the rebels have the interstellar version of the AK-47??? Seriously? We’ve got remote fired .50 caliber machine guns on vehicles that aim better than these people.
I didn’t get all the stuff falling in the warehouse fight scene other than it looked cool. There was no rhyme or reason to it. I can see CGI people having fun and hooting and hollering as they did it, but??? And really, those bad guys don’t know how to fast rope in on the target but have to land far away and hoof it in through a hostile population while splitting into thirds (they never studied Custer and his escapade at Little Big Horn apparently).
And why did the one element of the assault force suddenly grab the key female character running by them and ignore all the others running around and then stop their mission to stand around her? I suppose so they could shoot the poor sucker, aka her new boyfriend, who out of jealousy called in Andor’s location? Yep. He had to die so they did that. But it made absolutely no sense action-wise.
We get flashbacks to the hero’s childhood. Where he and the others watch a ship burn in. One that somehow, when they get to the crash site, is remarkably intact with survivors. Guess none of the writers ever saw what happens when even a chopper gets shot down.
Then there is the trope of a bad guy, the security guy who is determined to track down the killer. He’s so one-dimensional, he even ends up going home to mama and getting slapped on the face. They put out a casting call for spoiled, bratty adult and he turned up. Also, stupid, since he doesn’t follow the orders he’s left with.
We don’t find out until around Episode 4 or 5 that it’s about– of all things– a payroll robbery. Say what? Even the Marine Corps does direct deposit these days. You mean an empire with faster than light travel and flying cars needs to haul around a payroll?????? Where’s Butch and Sundance? At least get it on the way back. Or something. Okay, Firefly did a payroll robbery but at least they’re doing a Western set in Space as concept, so it works. And they have fun doing it. This series is so damn grim. No humor. Empire bad. Rebels good. Okay.
Then as they talk about the plan it requires our hero to fly a spacecraft into, you guessed it, a small, narrow tunnel. Hmm. I’ve not seen much Star Wars, but really. Is that all you’ve got?
I just felt a lack of imagination in character development and plot. I know they’re restricted by the canon, but still???
And I didn’t watch the last episodes so I’m sure it all paid off and all the plot points looped and I’m an idiot.
And I do shortcuts in my science fiction. My time patrol agents travel through time in a sentence—they were here and now and then they’re there and then. Sort of. Except I use the technique of these time portals being opened by the enemy who know something we don’t. I’m fine with looking past the plot problems any analysis will yield if we delve deep enough into any story. But you have to engage the viewer and this protagonist had nothing that engaged me. Nor did the arguing rebels. Nor the corporate type Empire people in their spotless white uniforms. The backstory was a yawn.
Overall, the glaring inconsistencies kept stopping me from enjoying the story, which was mostly a bunch of people arguing with each other. About empire bad, rebels good, which is what its all based on.
This is personal preference and I’m obviously out of the loop. I don’t view Star Wars as science fiction. It’s more fantasy and that’s fine. For example, The Peripheral blows me away. Tight plotting, lots of plot loops with intriguing characters based on premises that you have to really think about. You want a pilot episode that will spin your mind? Watch the pilot of Westworld reboot (Peripheral is by the creators of the Westworld reboot BTW). So much is packed in there in terms of idea, plot and character. Yes, it went a bit off the tracks in later seasons but the start was great. And, yes, I liked the ending of the reboot of Battlestar.
So, yeah. I’m just not a Star Wars guy. What can I say? Sorry. Shoot at me with your blaster.
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