Jake Barter – A Man for All Seasons – Well, Summer Anyway

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Jake Barter is a shadowy figure who inhabits the Compound somewhere in the semi-mythical town of Dunwich, New England (state unspecified).  He is the sole proprietor of the website Orion’s Cold Fire and splits his time between battling the eldritch horror and annoying bureaucracy of Dunwich’s First Selectman Cthulhu and pursuing his avocations (science fiction writing, macrophotography and right-wing politics).  His schooling was in math, chemistry, engineering and classical languages.  In a past life he designed biopharmaceutical processing plants.  Now he concentrates on getting a decently brewed cup of coffee every morning.  He is happily married to Camera Girl and enjoys the status of patriarch, surrounded by his descendants and their relations.

This is the Author’s Bio I put on Amazon today.  For a figment of my imagination, it comes reasonably close to being a facsimile of me.  If I had known what a pain in the neck it is selling a book I might have been dissuaded from doing it.  There’s an enormous amount of hand-waving and classifying and “key words” and other stuff that I thought I could slough off on other people entirely.  Then there’s Amazon Ads and Goodreads approval and before you know it I’ll have to be interviewed by Oprah and the View.

But there is some progress being made.  I got my e-book listed with a pre-order page and an Author’s Page for Jake Barter up on Amazon and on Sunday a proof copy of the paperback will be arriving.  Supposedly it has some kind of watermark on it to designate it as “not for sale.”  But I’ll be playing around with it like a dog with his favorite bone.

As I mentioned the other day, this week was the first time I started thinking about what might be in the next book taking place in that “world.”  This one will have Connors trying to deal with a fractured America.  President Chastain and the red and blue states will be brokering short term arrangements as the Constitutional Convention is set up.  There will be plenty to discuss while the red states stand by the exits in case “business as usual” is what ends up prevailing.

I’m thinking of inventing a character who demands a new Declaration of Independence that includes the statement, “All Men are Created Unequal and endowed by their Creator with unique characteristics that require free association to ensure nobody has to be forced to endure unbearable neighbors.”

Now, that might sound as if it’s clear enough to avoid the same problems we’re having now from happening again.  But I’m convinced that’s not true.  It’s not the words on the paper.  It’s not even the way the government is structured.  It’s inherent in human beings that they will twist whatever arrangements they live under to unfairly advantage themselves over their neighbors.  The Greeks and Romans went through these same things.  The rich and the powerful bend the government to their advantage and make their neighbors slaves.

Maybe the best way to deal with this is to tear the whole thing down to the ground every two hundred and fifty years.  Give everyone the same amount of stuff and start over.  It probably couldn’t be any worse than what happens if you don’t.  Well let’s see what George and Paul come up with.

You Were Always a Good Friend to Me

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As all who have followed my website know I’m a connoisseur of the various film versions of Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol.”  And I’ve opined before that the premiere version of the Ghost of Jacob Marley is Frank Finlay’s portrayal in the 1984 version with George C Scott as Scrooge.

Here is the whole scene:

Now, why do I say it’s best?  Technical presentation?  Acting ability?  Faithfulness to the book?  Emotional impact?  Actually, all of the above.  In all aspects of the scene this version is head and shoulders above all the rest.

The makeup on the ghost is wonderful as are his costume and the pattern and details of his fetters.  Even his eyes appear to be those of a dead man.  Finlay’s reading of the lines is masterful and the emotions he provides are wonderfully potent.  And the lines selected are the best selection from any of the versions out there.  And the climax of his performance is his outrage when Scrooge tells him, “But you were always a good man of business, Jacob.”

Marley howls, “Business!” Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

This one speech is easily seen as the reason for the whole story.  We see the partners face to face and we see what Scrooge cannot.  Marley was what Scrooge is; a terrible human being who cared not at all for his fellow creatures, their pain and suffering.  But death and judgement have taught him the error of his ways and in his shame and penitence he wants to save his old partner from himself.

And because he was as Scrooge is, he selects the instruments that have the best chance of reaching into Scrooge’s heart and mind and shaking him out of his evil habits and awaken in him the knowledge that the most precious treasure on this Earth is the chance to use our time to comfort those around us and recognize the kinship we all should have.

So those are the main points.  But even small bits contribute to this “Marley.”  When the ghost appears Scrooge demands to know what it wants of him.  Untying the funeral kerchief from around his head, his bottom jaw drops wide open with a loud clicking noise to indicate that he is a corpse.  Only once his mouth is unbound can he answer. “Much!”

So, yes.  This is the best Marley.  And George C Scott provides a fitting foil for Marley’s mission.  He is suitably impenitent and uninterested in Marley’s gift of potential reclamation.  When told of the three separate spiritual visits he asks Marley if they could all come at once and save time.  All in all, he is completely undeserving of Marley’s gift.  But as we shall see the scope of the gift that Marley procured manages to finally break through Scrooge’s shell of callousness.

Well done Jacob Marley.

So Now I’ve Got a Publication Date

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Update:

The Book Detail Page went live on Amazon:

Amazon book page

Wohoo!

I started loading the files for the e-book and paperback on Amazon.  The release date will be 21JAN2026.  I’m doing a last review of the text to find typos and “literary infelicities” before I hit the button and make the pre-release page live.

I’m setting up a page on the site (link directly below) for the marketer to direct traffic here.

Coming 21JAN2026 – The Sniper by Jake Barter

I have to admit I’m more excited about this than I thought I would be.  I’m especially looking forward to getting the paperback proof copy.  I’ll put it on the shelf of my bookcase in the living room between my copies of The Iliad and The Odyssey.  After all Homer has only produced two books in the last three thousand years and I wrote one in less than a decade!

I think today is the first time i started thinking about the next book in the series.  Bogey’s had his work.  I’ll let him off the hook and let Connors recruit some new folks to wrestle with the political chaos that has enveloped America after the events in “The Sniper.”  For this one i’ll have to map out a series of events.  I can’t just wing it.  Maybe I’ll do a “future history” timeline like Heinlein did for his alternate history stories.

I think in these later stories I might like to have a moon base.  It’s definitely not an unbelievable technological stretch and it would give the stories a less claustrophobic feel.  Mars just seems too difficult and with a fractured America I doubt the resources could be imagined available for something as challenging.

But that’s just a spit-balling thought.  I’m going to have to do some serious thinking before I just jump into it.  It’ll have to feel right.  And then I’ll have to come up some new characters.  I think I want some technical types in this story.  And I’ll have to think of what is going to happen to poor President George Chastain.  I’ll left him holding the bag with a bunch of states in basically open revolt.  He inherited this mess and he has my sympathy but I’m afraid it’s not going to get easier in the next book.

And in the next book I might try my hand at my first love story.  I’ve left Paul Connors and Grace Boghadair sort of up in the air.  With bogey out of the limelight maybe it’s time to see whether those two have a future.  Well, I’m no romance novelist but maybe I can come up with a believable plot to get those two together.  After all she is a widow looking for a husband and you can’t find a more eligible bachelor than the richest man in the world.

Well, I’ll attach the links to the Amazon pages for the books and the author (Jake Barter!) as soon as they’re live.  Meantime here are my cover shots.