All the Secrets of the Universe and Some Really Important Stuff Too!
That’s right get your free pdf copy of “The Sniper.” All that’s needed is to provide your e-mail address and view my harrangue at the end of the book to leave a review on Amazon. What’s fairer than that? Don’t answer that! It’s a rhetorical question as part of my sales pitch. Let me know if there are any problems with the download. This is my first attempt to use BookFunnel.
Click Here for Link to Sniper Giveaway
Update:
To verify my ownership of “The Sniper” for the Royal Road folks, I am adding this note to show I also control Orion’s Cold Fire.
We interrupt the daily progression of actual civil war to bring you a message about a fictional civil war story. I’ve finished the manuscript for my book, “The Sniper.” Now I’m looking for beta readers. I’m looking for folks to read the book and give me their honest feedback. Also I’d like to disseminate the book to friends and family who you judge would be a good fit for the book based on your estimation and if they agree to read it I’d like to get their opinions too.
I’m looking to get this book out to the largest group of people possible to see whether it is something that people will want to read. So after reading it if you think it’s appropriate for people you know let me hear that too. And remember, I’m not a fragile author. If you think it sucks, say so, but also tell me why you think it.
If you’re interested leave a comment to that effect and I’ll e-mail you a copy of the story. Now this is just a pdf. No nice cover, no actual paper. Just electrons. But I will guarantee that this sniper is nothing like the actual sniper we’ve had to hear about for the last week.
And just to remind you here’s the beginning of the book.
Chapter 1 – An Object Lesson
Joseph Boghadair was set up at a loophole in a small prefabricated metal building at the top of the mountain that contained the Icarus Mine. His .50 caliber sniper rifle was trained on the narrow road that led up to the mine. He could see a line of black SUVs about a mile and a half down the road and he was getting ready to start firing on the convoy. His first shots took out the engine of the lead vehicle thereby halting the convoy. His second volley took out the engine of the last car in line thus trapping the rest of the vehicles between. Then at a more leisurely pace he took care of the other eight vehicles. By this point the passengers were crouching behind their disabled cars and randomly firing handguns and automatic weapons in Joseph’s general direction with almost no discernible results.
After about half an hour a few of the men in black body armor attempted to reach a stand of trees about 300 yards away to their left. Joseph put a few well aimed rounds in front of their path and they quickly retreated back to the supposed safety of their not-so-mobile-autos. Joseph snorted wryly at their shyness.
An hour after that a helicopter approached the mountain from the opposite direction to Joseph’s loophole. Walking over to a window on the other wall he could see a distant Blackhawk approaching at relatively high altitude. Joseph then began his preparations for their reception.
Between crew and troops, the Blackhawk had a dozen men on board. And more importantly it had a couple of Hellfire missiles. From a very safe distance away it targeted Joseph’s position and fired. The missile struck precisely on target and obliterated the steel structure almost completely. All that remained was the foundation of the structure around the mine shaft, now clogged with debris.
The Blackhawk landed about three quarters of a mile from the mine entrance. At this point the agents, hunkered down behind their vehicles, began to stream toward the helicopter. By the time they reached the aircraft the troops had exited and were waiting for their rescued brethren to arrive.
FBI Special Agent in Charge, George Chastain assembled both teams and briefed them on the updated mission plan. “We will proceed to the mine head and look for any human remains. We will collect whatever we can retrieve for lab analysis and attempt to seal the mine head until qualified personnel can be assembled for recovery operations. It is presumed that the target, Joseph Boghadair was killed by the missile strike but we will take no chances. He was an extremely dangerous individual and should not be approached by anyone without backup and prior approval from leadership. In addition to his war record it is believed that Boghadair is responsible for the shooting deaths of forty-six people in the last six months with thirteen of those people being FBI personnel. No one enters the mine until remote sensing equipment is brought in. Alright, proceed.”
The agents formed two groups. Apparently, SUV agents and helicopter agents must not bond very well. But before they were more than a hundred feet from the helicopter the ground began to quake so powerfully beneath them that they were irresistibly knocked off their feet. And while they were clawing at the ground for dear life, they could see that the high ground where the mine head was located had collapsed into the earth. The roar of that collapse was more frightening than the initial earthquake and some of the agents hid their heads under their arms in abject terror. When the mountain stopped shaking the men started to collect themselves and stand up. When they looked around them, they were astonished. A circular pit had opened up centered on the mine head. It was a thousand yards in diameter and so deep that only blackness could be seen at its center. Several cracks had formed outside the circular pit. One of these had nearly swallowed the Blackhawk. It was on its side and half buried in the crevice. Its rotors were fractured and it wouldn’t be flying away from this landing.
Chastain went over to the edge of the crater and just stared down into the blackness below. Then he went back to his team and started giving orders to begin a retreat from the stricken mountain. He was trying to think of what he was going to tell his boss. Nothing reasonable came to mind.
New Art would better Nature’s best
But Nature knows a thing or two.
Owen Seaman
So, in line with my book writing chores I was outlining the beginning of the story. And because of the well-known story-writing dictum that the first scene should be a rip-snorting action extravaganza, I pondered how to do this. So, I thought to myself, “Self, what better way to start the story than with a massive drone attack on Connors and his inner circle!?” And I answered me saying, “Internal monologue alter ego, that’s a damn fine idea!” So that’s the direction I’ve decided on.
But a problem occurred to both of us; namely, I really don’t know much about drone attacks or repelling them. Well, that can be a problem. But in this age of LLM’s hanging around every corner I thought, “Well, let’s do some research.” And voila! not only am I an incredible fiction writer but I’m also now one of the world’s leading authorities on drones and defense against drone attacks. Crisis averted!
So now visions of solid-state high-power microwave (HPM), autonomous interceptor swarms, cheap directed-energy lasers and AI directed mini-guns and missiles are dancing in my head like toys at a kid’s Christmas. Poor Connors, with Bogey on vacation on the Left Coast how is he supposed to rest easy while his security is in the hands of lesser men? Sure, Cutter and Mel are certainly taking the technical lead in fortifying headquarters against any rogue agents of the intelligence agencies but as became apparent in the first book practical military experience is sorely lacking at Typhon Industries. Well, what a perfect time for a sneak attack.
So now I’m gleefully outlining the fallout from the attack including Bogey’s return to active duty with his friend Becky (former waitress, now main squeeze) in tow. So, this will allow me to push the political story forward. If the CIA, etc. are running rogue operations, Connors will have no choice but to begin affecting the political dynamic to advantage himself and weaken elements of the US deep state.
So, I’m going to give myself a B- so far on my first two days of outlining and since this passes (sort of), as an outlining activity I won’t penalize myself for stealing a little time for this post. I still haven’t worked out anything about Grace and her kids. I may have to consult with Camera Girl on that angle. After all, with killer drones targeting Connors, Bogey might step in and forbid his family from going within several miles of that marked man. It kind of makes sense.
As far as sf tropes and gizmos I haven’t decided what whizz bang stuff will be rolled out in this story. I feel I have to because that stuff is so much fun it would be disappointing if I didn’t. At the very least there is going to be lots of artificial intelligence involved because Mel’s status as an (apparently) self-aware machine needs to be explained and explored. After all she’s Camera Girl’s favorite character and she is kind of engaging for the writer too. Well, that’s enough for now.
Comments:
WarPig
“Please go to YouTube, search for “Slaughterbots”. Choose the DUST version with length of 7:59 That’ll give you an opening scenario.
This scared me back in 2010. The video was released in 2017. Events in Ukraine have proven it to be coming very soon. Those of us in the know have been warning the powers that be since 2010. The US can already use “Ginsu” missiles with blades instead of explosives to target and kill an individual and knows which seat in a blacked-out SUV to hit.
Darpa has been working on this “I imagine”, for over two decades, Musk’s new solid state batteries, better than lithium, has the potential to give the little ones the range and on-station time to do this. Ukraine isn’t exactly MIT or Cal Poly, yet they are halfway there already, with what “I imagine” is US help.
Slaughterbots would have to be countered by swarms of “hunter-seekers” with the ability to tell friendly minidrone from enemy. Also we’d need new and advanced surveillance technologies to find evil bots as soon as they are launched. Remember, these things in the video enter buildings and can fly along streets at a few feet of altitude. Almost impossible to trace since they are not guided from an external controller by radio waves. No bot emmissions. No way to block their controllers as there are no controllers. They are kamikaze. One set of instructions, then let them fly, do or die.
Scary.”
photog
You’re right. That’s pretty damn scary.
Whene’er I walk the public ways,
How many poor that lack ablution
Do probe my heart with pensive gaze,
And beg a trivial contribution!
Owen Seaman
Today I was diligent and did my sequel work from 8:30am to 11am so life is good and I have an easy assignment for a post today. Camera Girl and I went out to the movies yesterday. Of course, because we’re ancient we went to the 10:45 am showing and the theater on a Tuesday morning was virtually empty. We went to see “Runner” with Alan Ritchson and Owen Wilson. Ritchson is the actor who plays Reacher in the Amazon series. The plot has Ritchson as a courier who handles “special” deliveries. He is supposed to deliver Owen Wilson and a transplant liver to a hospital where a little girl is on death’s door. But there is also a drug cartel boss who wants the liver for his mother. So, we get two hours of chase scenes, shootouts and fights culminating at the hospital where the little girl is waiting. And it wouldn’t qualify as a spoiler if I tell you how it all ends. But I won’t.
It was made by Angel Studios and I won’t say that it is a much lower quality than a big studio production but there’s a kind of “over the top” aspect to some of the scenes. I would say generically, it’s an action/chase movie where the action is dialed up to eleven and stays there. The fight scenes and the chase scenes go on and on seemingly for the whole movie. So, if you have a limited tolerance for these scenes this will strain your patience. As far as the acting, Ritchson does a workmanlike job of his part which is quite similar to the Reacher character. Owen Wilson plays his usual Owen Wilson persona. Meaning he’s a quirky affable, loquacious man who drives Ritchson’s strong, silent character insane with his endless banter. The bad guys are everything you would want for the cartoon villains and cars, trucks and anything available is crashed, burned or blown up as needed.
Alright, I’ve said enough. This movie is a silly action/adventure/comedy/buddy movie. Does it work? Mostly. Would I recommend it? Well, I’d have to qualify if by saying if you like Owen Wilson and you like watching Alan Ritchson doing his incredible hulk imitation then yes, you’ll enjoy this. If you’re a big fan of action movies you also might like it. Otherwise maybe it might be too over the top for you.
The elegant simplicity of the three per cents.
(Note: “The three per cents” (or “Three Per Cents”) was the common name for Britain’s consolidated annuities—perpetual government stock created in the mid-18th century that paid a fixed 3% interest.)
William Scott
So, the promotion is done. And the results are very encouraging. There’s been an uptick in all three types of orders; paperbacks, e-books and Kindle Unlimited pages. In fact, today I’ve had all three types of sales and another two five-star ratings showed up so a very good way to end the promotion and the Based Book Sale. Bravo!
But now the real work begins. I’ve got to go forward with outlining and writing the next book. And to do that correctly I have to (as my father used to say) “buckle down.” I need to devote several hours every day to writing. And those have to be early in the morning when my mind isn’t yet reduced to the soupy mush it will become by later in the day. And so that means something’s gotta give. And that something will have to be my daily posts.
Some days I’ll be a ball of fire. I’ll bang out page after page of deathless prose, take care of the chores at the Compound, grovel and genuflect to First Selectman Cthulhu and still manage to write a post. But not always. Some days I’ll put a song up instead. Or maybe nothing at all. I’ll try to keep up with the photos and quotes. That shouldn’t overwhelm me. But trying to produce five hundred coherent words on a topic that might interest the folks on the site is going to be beyond my powers of concentration for the foreseeable future. I’m putting this out there to let everybody know how it is.
For most of you this won’t be a great hardship. My mental powers have greatly diminished over the decade and more that I’ve been producing this blog and it may actually be a relief to know the ordeal is over. But for me it’s kind of sad. I’ve tried to be as reliable as I could be to the task. But at the same time, I’ve got a strong desire to make this next book something special so I need to concentrate on quality and I need to finish it sooner than later because the longer I wait the fewer people who read the first book will be anxious to buy the sequel.
So, there you go. I’m announcing the official “Shirking of OCF.” I am AWOL and no power in the ‘verse can stop me. I will understand if everyone deletes the web address and heads for greener pastures but I just want to add it’s been great talking to all you folks over the years and feel free to stop by whenever you feel like just in case I manage to produce readable text on that particular day.
Hasta la vista baby!
