Jax Book Nook

Happy 4th of July everyone! We’re taking a break from “A Week in Pandemonium” in order to speak with a presidential candidate who’s getting a lot of attention after last week’s debate. I’m here with Lester Yazstrimski who has thrown his hat into the ring. Introduce yourself, Mr. Yazstrimski!

Lester: Please call me Lester. Everyone does. Mr. Yazstrimski is my father.

Me: Ah! It’s just that you appear to be in your mid-40s, so I didn’t think you would mind. You also decided to come to this interview wearing sweatpants and a wife-beater t-shirt.

Lester: Yeah, it’s kind of my schtick. Like, I’m a regular guy.

Me: Huh. Well, tell me about yourself, Lester.

Lester: I am 43 years old. I live in Little Rock, Arkansas. I’ve never been convicted of a felony, and I’m mentally competent. I’m willing to take any cognitive test you feel is necessary to prove that last part. I’ve never had a part of my brain eaten by a parasite or tried to overthrow the government by force. I’ve never said anything nice about any third world dictator, or asked them to release dirt on my opponents. I would like to be President.

Me: What do you currently do for a living?

Lester: I’m in between opportunities. Hopefully, this time next year I’ll be President and they get paid like $400k. That and you get a free house to live in so I can move out of my mother’s basement.

Me: You’re unemployed and living with your parents at the age of 43?

Lester: Yeah, I’ve had a slow start in life, but the advantage of that is that you don’t have to worry about the president having any kids who are public embarrassments if the President is a 300-pound, unemployed incel. My kid can’t be addicted to crack or meeting with Russian spies if I’ve never had sex, right?

Me: Supposedly if you got elected President you could get a date.

Lester: That’s what I’m hoping. Fingers crossed.

Me: Look, I find it strange that the most you can say for yourself is that you have never been convicted of a crime.

Lester: A felony. Never been convicted of a felony. Like, if you check my record, you’ll see that one time I punched a cop, but we pled it down to a misdemeanor cause it was my first offense and I was having a panic attack.

Me: Let’s move onto the issues. First, the economy. What’s your plan?

Lester: First, I’m going to get a job, hopefully as President, though a spot just opened up at Pizza Hut for a delivery driver. Mostly, I was thinking steady as she goes.

Me: You mean you don’t plan to change anything?

Lester: No, unemployment’s low and inflation’s getting better. Probably better to kick back and just collect the check.

Me: What about foreign policy? What about Ukraine? Or Gaza?

Lester: You just used a few words I didn’t recognize. Those are probably weird places on a map that I don’t know anything about, so I would probably just have the military tell me whether to send money or bombs to wherever it is you were talking about.

Me: What about social issues?

Lester: Oh, I love the blacks and the gays, as long as they don’t do it in the park. I mean the border is like, screwed up though.

Me: What would you do about it?

Lester: Nuke it.

Me: Nuke our own border.

Lester: Gotta nuke something.

Me: Lester, I’m beginning to think you aren’t really qualified to be president and you don’t know anything about the relevant issues. You seem to just want to be president because you can’t find any other work. This is the most important job in the world with the most power and responsibility any human being has ever had. Why would anyone vote for you?

Lester: I promise that most days you won’t have to think of me. Things will be so boring, you won’t even remember you have a president, or a government for that matter. I just need a place to crash and a steady paycheck.

Me: I can’t believe this. I was told that your campaign was picking up momentum across America.

Lester: It is. We raised $2,000,000 in donations since the last debate. The last Ipsos poll has me at 20%. Take a look.

(Lester hands me a printout of a poll, which confirms what he just said.)

Me: I am sad now.

Lester: I can cheer you up. Let me introduce you to my VP pick.

(Lester leaves the room and brings back a chimpanzee dressed in a miniature suit)

Lester: Meet Mr. Nanners. Yeah, he’s an ape, but people tell me it doesn’t really matter who the vice-president unless you die. My doctor tells me that I should at least live to be 60.

Me: Well, that’s reassuring. Any parting words?

Lester: Yeah, could you tell your readers to send any donations directly to my student loan broker. I’ve nearly got it paid off. Just one more debate like that, and I’m made.

Me: I guess Biden succeeded at paying off somebody’s student loans.

Another Week in Pandemonium coming your way: June 24-30

June 24, 1947-Local resident Schlumiel Berkowitz spots a UFO just off the eastern coast of Pandemonium Island. His claims are quickly rebutted with the common phrase “There goes Schlumiel again.”

June 25, 1913—Both Stranger and Witch veterans of the Civil War attend the Great Reunion of 1913. Their visit is cut short, as Pandemonium’s delegation devolves into a fist fight that has to be broken up by local authorities.

June 26, 2001—Satanic High Priest Acton Ravenwood attempts to sue J. K. Rowling for plagiarism, claiming the magic in her books is based directly on the rites of the Satanic Temple. Ravenwood is laughed out of court when he cites The Onion as a source.

June 27, 1760—During the French and Indian War, a joint party of Strangers and Witches patrol Cherokee territory as part of the local militia. They are subsequently discovered, ambushed and massacred when two members of the patrol loudly argue over a flask of gin and a piece of salted pork.

June 28, 1870—The U.S. Congress establishes the first four federal holidays: New Years Day, July 4^th, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Pandemonium residents start a letter writing campaign to request a special act of Congress to close the local post office on the Winter Solstice as well.

June 29, 1797—Satanic High Priest Beauregard Davis is born, coinciding with a solar eclipse.

June 30, 1688—James II sends a military commander, Jonathon Standish, to Pandemonium in order to bring order to the wayward colony. Alas, the king is overthrown soon thereafter, leading to Standish being boiled alive in town square.

Hello everyone! I am proud to announce that my literary agent now predicts we will publish “Christmas in Pandemonium” by the end of 2024, with an anticipated release date some time before Christmas. With that in mind, let me begin promoting in Earnest with another segment of “This Week in Pandemonium: June 17-23.”

June 17, 2004–The first Pandemonium reaches space as Ze’ev resident Michael Greenblatt is set in orbit by NASA to see whether he transforms during full moon in zero gravity. Results are mixed as the moon is only partially visible from the shuttle, leaving Mr. Greenblatt very hairy and with long teeth, but still standing upright.

June 18, 1974–Pandemonium Mayor Lucien Stormwater resigns in shame after admitting to having mishandled $21.45 in petty change from the city’s treasury. Wow, what used to be considered corruption.

June 19, 1865–Fieldhands celebrate their new freedom on Juneteenth…which they had received earlier that year as Pandemonium was liberated by Sherman’s army February. Most Fieldhands take advantage of the confusion by trying to get out of town.

June 20, 1621–Captain John Miller and Satanic High Priest Thomas Cramner meet for the first formal signing of the Bargain, Pandemonium’s governing document. Cramner insists on signing the Bargain in blood, and Miller obliges him, calling upon his first officer to cut his arm. The cut is infected and turns gangrene, leading to the amputation of the arm using primitive 17th century medicine.

June 21, 1919–Striking workers clash with police in Pandemonium’s industrial southwest industrial district, leaving three workers and one office dead. Field Servant Marcus Johnson blesses the bodies and finds a strange note in the policeman’s pocket.

June 22, 1774–In response to the Quebec Act, Satanic High Priest Calvin Brontious drafts a similar request for religious liberty, which he is then dissuaded from sending by his overly cautious congregation. Brontious later stated that he couldn’t imagine the English hating Satanists more than they hated Catholics.

June 23, 1917–The first Pandemonian to play in the Major Leagues, Stuart Bailey, takes the mound for the Red Sox in a game against the New York Giants. Bailey finishes a victory for the Sox after Babe Ruth is ejected for punching an umpire in the face.

Haven’t gotten a publication date for Christmas in Pandemonium yet, but I’ve decided to start promoting the book with a new feature: “This Week in Pandemonium.” As an explainer for those reading about Pandemonium for the first time, Pandemonium is the town my book is based in that was founded in South Carolina by Satanists in the year 1620. Four groups of people live there: the Witches (descended from the aforementioned Satanists), the Strangers (disreputable pirates turned Christian religious fanatics), the Fieldhands (Pandemonium’s African-American community), and the Ze’ev (Jewish werewolves who immigrated to Pandemonium in the 1890s). For this week: June 9-16.

June 9, 1912–The famous Athena Oratorium opens in Pandemonium. The Athena will become one of the premiere venues for jazz, ragtime, and the blues in the U.S. The building was donated by Grand Dame Elizabeth Davis who claimed the building was once a ballroom where her father, Col. Robert Davis, met her mother, though historians believe it may have served as the burlesque house in the antebellum south.

June 10, 1672–Stranger smugglers are caught trading directly with Spanish ships in defiance of English colonial law. Their confiscated cargo includes lumber, tobacco, and some very odd statues bearing strange ruins.

June 11, 1929–Alan Grayson, famous head coach of the Cramner Red Devils, is born. Grayson, who would go on to lead the Red Devils to an NCAA Football Championship in 1984, would be consecrated to Satan, per family tradition, three days after his birth.

June 12, 1945–Pandemonium resident Bunim Greenblatt is awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for taking out an entire German division on the night of February 9 in the same year.

June 13, 1960–Federal District Court Judge and Stranger-Born Brian Applewaith strikes down state and local laws requiring the segregation of public schools and crafts an integration order, mandating that Pandemonium High School admit seven Fieldhand students when school starts in August. Satanic High Priest Blaise Jackson responds by placing a curse on Judge Applewaith.

June 14, 1897–The day before a full moon, the newly arrived Ze’ev lay the cornerstone of Temple Ze’ev, now on the National Register of Historic Landmarks. An antisemitic mob of Strangers gather to burn the building down. Of the 25 men who assemble to take part in the mayhem, six return.

June 15, 1776– Pandemonium votes to declare independence from Great Britain nearly a month before Jefferson’s famous declaration. A committee of Witches drafts a declaration and passes it inside the town meeting hall at 3 am with the doors locked to avoid interference from Loyalist Strangers.

June 16, 1822–During the height of the Era of Good Feelings, the Stranger Mayor and Witch Mayor of the town meet at a gazebo for lunch, and after sharing a meal of succotash and fried chicken, shake hands and tip their hats to each other. This is followed by a riot and an election where both men are voted out and then tarred and feathered.

If you’ve ever tried to promote a book, chances are, you’ve had to do some mandatory five-star reviews. For all of those who have stretched the truth once or twice when trading reviews, this post is for you.

***

All right, I’m giving this book a five-star review, for two reasons. 1. My wife made me read it. 2. She says I have to like it too. Lords and Ladies is probably the 25th most popular romance series set in the Victorian age on the market today. It’s no wonder given just how many sex scenes there are. Now, the author says in a foreword that he wanted the book to be historically accurate, and that’s why half of the scenes involve sex with prostitutes. My wife made me skip over those.

No, she’s really into the parts where the lady and the lord play croquet in the backyard and then end up having sex in a shed. Yes, that part was okay. She tells me that it’s to give me ideas. I don’t know how it could do that. We don’t even have a shed. Our home is on a hill. She doesn’t know how to play croquet.

More interesting is the plot. You see, the male protagonist, Count Bufort, doesn’t want to give his heart to anyone because his father died after getting a blister from playing tennis on his foot, and dies from the infection. The Count doesn’t want to lose someone again, so he avoids connections like falling in love. The climax of the book occurs when the female protagonist gets a blister in the same place on her foot and nearly dies. It’s truly a testament to how primitive medical care and hygiene was in the 19th Century. The doctor even uses leeches.

True love prevails in the end, however. Lady Lisandra survives the infection, in spite of her doctors, and she marries Count Bufort, followed by forty pages of graphic descriptions of carnal lust. These were the sex scenes I was allowed to read, and yes, they have sex everywhere. The beach, at church, in the middle of Hyde Park in London. I would have thought that Victorian sexual mores would prohibit this, or at least cause the lady to protest, but the author keeps repeating how they are married now, and supposedly that makes all of this fine in the eyes of God and man. I do wonder how historically accurate it was for Lady Lisandra to ask the Count where babies come from.

Th story ends with the Count and his wife have nine children, the Count becoming the richest man in London, and Lady Lisandra being raised up on a pedestal in front of the rest of high society and showered in roses. A little on the nose for my taste, but why not? This book is a female fantasy, and my wife seems to like it. It succeeds on that level. Five stars.

After my non-post two weeks ago, I doubled down on getting my current project done, and here we are. I have finished the first draft of “Pandemonium: Death and Ashes.” Since the first book hasn’t been published yet, I won’t try to summarize it other than to say it picks up right where the last book ended. As you may remember, this is part II of my book series on a town founded by Satanists in the year 1620. Part I is supposed to be published by I Ain’t Your Marionette Press later this year. I’m going to wait a month before taking another look at it, but I’m satisfied with the work. The novel currently stands at about 81,000 words, which is shorter than “Christmas in Pandemonium” by just a hair.

As for “At Home in the Cloud,” that’s currently in Beta Reading. Wasn’t able to find too many people for Beta Reading. I got one regular, who I really appreciate. May just have to sit on this one for a while. That was something I wrote on a whim.

Beer Run II hasn’t sold too well, but I’ve been concentrating on other things. I wrote Beer Run to burnish my resume to get Pandemonium published. That’s why I’ve been concentrating on the other stuff. In the future, I’ll try to post more often, but I’ve got to take some rest. Creatively, I’ve exhausted myself, as I said two weeks.

You may have noticed that my blog posts are few and far between these days. That’s because I’ve had a lot going on at work, and at home, and honestly, writing other stuff. That other stuff being writing two novels in the same year. Yeah, that kind of stuff. I started writing “At Home in the Cloud” in January, and I finished the first draft in March. I submitted a chapter for reviews but didn’t get anybody to take me up on a review of the entire book. I’ve now submitted chapter two and I am waiting to hear back.

The big event this year, of course, was hearing that my novel “Christmas in Pandemonium” would be published by I Ain’t Your Marionette Press. This is what I had been working on for three years, but it created the good problem of giving me another project to put on the fire: namely, a sequel to “Christmas in Pandemonium.” That’s still in the drafting stage, but right now, it’s already over 46,000 words. Given the length of “Christmas in Pandemonium,” that’s about halfway done.

All of this has left me with too much to do, such that I have been sparing in writing on this blog. Partially, it’s because I have been concentrating on writing and revising the two novels. And the other part is…I have been writing and revising two novels. You see, writing two novels takes your time away, but it also takes away your creative juices. I’ve learned that I am really only capable of being so creative at a given time, and right now, all of my creative juices are dedicated to the novels.

Maybe my creative juices will recover once I’ve finished the novel, but right now, I’m tapped out.

Just finished the first season of Fallout. As someone who’s a fan of the video games and who has written about those games on this blog, I have to say that I am enjoying the show. However, there is one plot twist that I can’t really get behind: the decision to make Vault-Tec the main bad guy. Why? Well, it comes down to motivation.

Some recap: the Fallout world takes place in the United States, 200 years after nuclear war. Part of humanity has taken refuge in a series of vaults underground. These vaults are constructed by Vault-Tec, a private corporation, that sells spots in the vault. In the game, it becomes clear that many of these vaults were designed to conduct experiments on their human inhabitants. The show has Vault-Tec go beyond experiments, and actually makes Vault-Tec the cause of the nuclear war to begin with. Then, a Vault-Tec executive, kept alive for centuries in a pod and awakened 200 years later, destroys a city. We see executives splitting the vaults amongst themselves and planning human experiments.

Question: why? In South Park, we get an episode where underwear gnomes are stealing Tweak’s underwear while his dad tries to get a big corporate coffee shop run out of town. Our protagonists find the underwear gnomes who explain their plan. It goes like this: underwear. question mark. profit. The joke here is that corporations exist to make money, and the underwear gnomes’ actions of stealing underwear make no sense in light of that goal.

Big corporations make good villains because they have a clear motive: making money. The problem comes when you have big corporations literally cause the end of the world. Vault-Tec executives propose dropping a bomb in order to conduct their vault experiments…Why? How can they make money if the world dies in a nuclear holocaust? Same thing with the other companies in the world. They exist to make money. How does conducting experiments in isolated vaults help them make money when the world has been wiped out by nuclear weapons?

Indeed, in the Fallout world, the billions of dollars these corporations already have become worthless overnight. People start using bottlecaps for currency. This isn’t just a problem in the show. It’s been hinted in the games that Vault-Tec was a big player in the war. The problem, once again, is that Vault-Tec stops making money if the war they are scaring people about actually happens. It’s actually what makes Vault-Tec really evil: they sell people spaces in vaults in the event of a war they clearly don’t expect to happen. If they did, the money they took would be worthless. If they actually thought the war was happening, they would demand to be paid in gold.

That problem disappears if they create these experimental vaults at the behest of a government agencies. Government contractors do any number of odd things if the price is right. Nor is there any general problem with making a big corporation a villain, so long as you aren’t literally ending the world. If all the big corporation is doing is dumping toxic waste near schools or forcing workers to survive in an acid mine, then that works because the world is still around to make money in. The problem comes when you have a profit driven company intentionally create a post-apocalyptic world where making a profit is impossible.

Fallout is not the only franchise to have this problem. Resident Evil has the Umbrella Corporation create a zombie apocalypse for seemingly no reason. Greed’s a good motivation for a villain, but most greedy people know that robbing a bank is pointless if you have to obliterate the city it’s in to do it.

I am proud to announce the moment I have worked for over the past four years has come to pass: my magnum opus “Christmas in Pandemonium” has been accepted at I Ain’t Your Marionette Publishing House. My thanks to the editorial staff at I Ain’t Your Marionette Publishing House and to my literary agent, Joe Dycut. I hope this is the beginning of a fruitful partnership.

To give a recap, Christmas in Pandemonium is the first book in a planned series of seven to take place in the town of Pandemonium, South Carolina. While Plymouth was founded by pilgrims and Philadelphia was founded by Quakers, Pandemonium was founded by Satan worshipping witches in the year 1620. They are joined by the Strangers, a group of disreputable pirates who turn into Christian religious zealots after seeing the Witches commit an act of human sacrifice. They are later joined by the Fieldhands, which is the name for Pandemonium’s African-American Community, and the Ze’ev, a Jewish sect that turns into big furry monsters during the full moon. Other than that, it’s a normal town.

The story begins in the present day when the Strangers decide to sell their church to Miles Simon, a Prosperity Gospel preacher. Simon discovers the Strangers have a vampire, Theo, living in their basement, and that he can hypnotize people with his eyes. When Simon proposed to Theo that he use his powers to force people to give them money, Theo refuses. Simon then resurrects Scratch, Theo’s vampiric rival, hoping he’ll be willing to deal. Scratch has other plans. Now, the locals have to hunt him down. On the other side of the island, the Davis family works to reform the Satanic rituals, unbeknownst to the current Satanic High Priest, Acton Ravenwood.

I hope everyone reading this blog post will pick up a copy. I’m looking forward to promoting my book on social media and in stores.

I’ve been enjoying X-Men ’97. Takes me back to my time watching the show as a kid. Great animation, quality plots, engaging character development. My complements to everyone who works on the show.

However, X-Men as a property always made me wonder about the rest of the Marvel Universe. In the event the people who read my blog have never heard of X-Men, (if so, how are you able to read this blog on that remote desert island without internet access you are apparently living on?), it’s a comic book where people are born with superpowers as a result of natural evolution. These people, called mutants, are hated and feared by the world, leading to discriminatory laws and the creation of robots who hunt them down called Sentinels. (Funny. X-Men was originally written in the 1960s during the civil rights movement, but today with all the hysteria over AI, the American public would probably find the creation of a legions of robotic bounty hunters to be a lot more threatening than the odd person who can direct the laws of magnetism.)

Great concept, but if the Marvel Universe has people who were just born with superpowers, no other explanation needed, and these people are hated and feared, I have to wonder how this affects the other superheroes in the universe.

***

Peter Parker: So that’s it, I’m Spider-Man.

(Mary Jane and Harry look at each other as Peter stands before them in his Spidey-suit, sans mask. They both appear concerned and a little incredulous.)

Peter: Is something wrong?

Harry: Peter, I’m your friend. I’m really glad you’re willing to come out and tell me this about yourself. You can tell us anything. But this story about being bitten by a radioactive spider….

Peter: What about it?

Mary Jane: Peter, we’re a couple. You know I’m not prejudiced against mutants, and neither is Harry. If you’re a mutant, you can just tell us. You don’t have to come up with some silly story about being bitten by a radioactive spider.

Peter: It’s not a story. I was really bitten by a radioactive spider. That’s how I got my powers.

Harry: Peter, I mean, come on. We don’t know as much about science as you do, but I know enough that irradiating a spider doesn’t turn its venom into some kind of magic potion.

Peter: Well, this time it did. I know because I got my powers right after that.

Mary Jane: Peter, you actually seem to believe this, but let me ask you: when do mutants normally get their powers?

Peter: When they hit puberty.

Mary Jane: When were you bitten by this spider?

Peter: Fifteen.

Mary Jane: Yeah, you were always a late bloomer.

Harry: I think MJ’s just saying that there’s a much more rational explanation for this.

Peter: Look, not everyone who has superpowers is a mutant. Just the vast majority of people. I mean, do you guys think Captain America is a mutant?

Mary Jane: He could be. Why not?

Peter: He was around in the 40s. Mutants didn’t start showing up until the 60s.

Harry: They started coming out in the 60s. That doesn’t mean they didn’t exist back then.

***

Steve Rogers: Nick, I just think we need to come clean.

Nick Fury: Why?

Steve: Why? They’re actively discussing laws against mutants in Congress right now. Professor Xavier just called me up on the phone and asked why I’m not saying anything about it, and I really couldn’t give him a straight answer.

Nick: You said something. You condemned the law on Twitter. What else do you need to do?

Steve: No, Nick, I mean Xavier asked me why I didn’t “come out.” If one of those laws passes, it will apply to me.

Nick: No, there’s an exception in the law for people who weren’t born with their powers.

Steve: Nick. You can’t possibly believe what you’re saying.

Nick: What? You got your powers from a super serum developed by a scientist during the World War II.

Steve: A super serum that was only used twice, despite being completely effective, during a war where the fate of western civilization was at stake? You’re telling me that America developed a super weapon during World War II that it only used twice despite being involved in a Cold War for forty years and God knows what else? Who believes that?

(A Japanese scientist in the corner gives Steve an awkward side-eye)

Nick: Well, you know better than anyone that the guy who created it died.

Steve: And he never wrote the formula down anywhere? We haven’t been able to recreate the formula in the eighty years since then? It’s just not plausible. I need to just tell people I’m a mutant, Nick.

Nick: No one here heard that. It’s classified.

Clint Barton: Sir, it might not matter. You probably need to watch the news.

***

(Bruce Banner appears in front of a podium. The press surrounds him, waiting for him to speak)

Bruce: Thank you all for being here. As you know, the U.S. Congress has started to consider legislation to deal with the mutant “issue,” as it’s been called. To say nothing about the fleet of robots patrolling the streets to find Magneto, which is kind of a strange thing to do actually. Why are you sending metal robots after Magneto?

Anyway, in the current climate, I find that I can stay silent no longer. In the past, I have told you that I received my powers after being caught in the explosion of a gamma bomb I devised. That is a lie. I am a mutant. So are Captain American, Thor, and Scarlet Witch. I can’t believe we got away with this for so long, particularly given how facile the lie was.

The important thing to do now is vote down any proposed laws that restrict the freedom of mutants. We’ve been defending America against criminals, Nazis, and aliens for almost a century now. I think we’ve earned the public’s trust. Yes, some people born with powers abuse them. That could be said about any power, particularly the kind held by people in government. I will now take questions.

Reporter: Mr. Banner, are you sure you didn’t get your powers in a Gamma Bomb explosion?

Bruce: No, I would think intelligent people would realize that would kill a man.

Reporter: What about a gamma ray infused super serum?

Bruce: There are no super serums. Radiation doesn’t do that to people. Those are all just excuses the federal government uses to hide the fact that they employ mutants to deal with threats to America even as those hypocritical assholes threaten to restrict our civil liberties.

Reporter: What if you’re a space alien or a god?

Bruce: I know that I’m not either of those things. Look I’m telling you that I’m just a mutant. Why would you want me to be anything else?

Reporter: Because I don’t want you fucking people living in my goddamn neighborhood, that’s why!

Bruce: Okay, sir, I’m about to get mad.

(Upon hearing this, everyone in the room other than Bruce screams and flees the area. Bruce just looked into the camera and deadpans.)

Bruce: Some people just can’t control themselves.