Barbara's Blog

  The Darwath Trilogy will be downpriced digitally, through Open Road Media, US and Canada, Sunday, October 3, $2.99. But that's not the big issue. Trolling around the Net last night when I should have been making my dinner, I encountered about a dozen images from medieval manuscript illumination that caused me to wonder: Who was putting what into the ale supply of those monasteries? Was this 1950s science-fiction time-slipped back to the 12th century? WTF? The last one - at least from what my gardener friends have said - is at least understandable. But for the rest... Is there something about the Middle Ages that we haven't heard about? (Particularly what appears to be an airborne snail in Picture #2)? (Which could actually be pretty disgusting in combat, when you think about it.) https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/why-were-medieval-knights-always-fighting-snails-1728888/

  Tuesday, Sept. 28, George Effinger's "When Gravity Fails" will be on sale through Open Road Media, $1.99, digital, US and Canada. It's one of his best. He always claimed it was his attempt to channel Raymond Chandler, but in truth, it was his desire to write about the French Quarter as he knew it in the '70s and '80s, but in science fictional guise. In other news, I'm wrapping up Benjamin January #19 - "Death and Hard Cider". I thought about calling it "Tippecanoe and Murder, Too," but suspect that too few people even know about that whole Presidential campaign: the first campaign to use modern hoopla, marketing, and publicity stunts, including the campaign slogan, "Tippecanoe and Tyler, Too!". ("Old Tippecanoe" was the name the Whig party chose for their candidate, William Henry Harrison. John Tyler was his VP). I've spent the past several months shaking my head over the research on the Election of 1840. They