Music blog- Julie London

Because wow.

Figured I play some of this.

When you play Social Justice, the world loses.

Injustice Book Review: Loki's Child

Cower not, fierce reader! We have today a tale of upsetting the social order. A work of satire...or is it? Please note, this book is not for the gentle of spirit.

Fenris Wulf has presented us with an interesting tale, filled with crimes against Social Justice.  The first section of the book is filled with accusations against the modern "music" industry.  We have stories of talent getting ignored and buried, a culture that hates its supporters and enablers that will commit any crime to make the record happen.

We are also presented with a blatant hatred of all things leftist. That does not push our characters to the opposition party, for in fact they do not oppose but in name. Actual rights are abandoned in favor of rights that put one at the mercy of or in the control of the government. The government is shown repeatedly to be complicit in crimes of kidnapping, drugging, and outright murder of people that are problematic. Hmm.

As I stated, there are moments where one is unsure of it being satire. Of course, there are things that are clearly satire, such as Presidential trial and succession by duel. These are televised, of course. Blackmail, obsession, and divided loyalties are the tools of the day, and there are no depths the story's villains will not stoop to.


This story will make you laugh, mostly at how close to reality it is. The music industry actively avoids talent, audiences don't listen anyway, and our political parties have been so similar it's ridiculous. A fine story, and one I'm happy to recommend. 7/10 fell deeds.

Now, I'm going to address one aspect of this book I have some evidence for: the quality of editing done by Vox Day and the Castalia House team.  An early version of this tome was one of Castalia House's new release newsletter free books. I started reading that version; I actually got bored, and did not finish. Since then, it has been tightly edited to within an inch of its identity, and everything unnecessary has been chopped out. The transformation is remarkable, in terms of how much better the book became, while keeping the same story. Congratulations on the transformation, Vox.

I would like to further note that this is no insult to Fenris Wulf.  I have seen some unedited versions of John C. Wright's work, and he needs editing as well, despite being a master of prose. This is not for the quality of the words, but rather, the flow of the narrative, and an editor makes all the difference.

When you play Social Justice, the world loses.

Market Share: It's a thing

And the Big 5 publishers are losing it. Their audiences are shrinking, as they keep pushing diversity. There's this little thing called the Author Earnings report, and it shows that people aren't reading less, just shifting where they purchase their fiction from. Hint: it ain't  the big publishers, and it's becoming unlikely that agents will be useful.

Enough of my little ranting. Brian Niemeier has a great blog post analyzing it, and why do the work twice?  Those trends look like small publishers and self publishing is the way to go. Hmm. Like Brian Niemeir, Declan Finn, and Nick Cole have done. They found their audience, Mr. Cole was even kicked to the curb by a major publisher, and had a bestseller by self publishing.

So who's buying, if the SJWs aren't? Could it be their enemis, the Sad and Rabid Puppies are moderates and conservatives who establishment SFF kept insulting? Could it be that Christians are returning to genres they practically founded, as the atheist brigade can't gatekeep them out?

It's just like in English classes when the teacher had a favorite subversive thing that bored everyone to tears. It went unread except by those that wanted to actually know the topic. Everyone else read the Cliff Notes. Now the suckups parrot all the talking points of their "leaders", guys like Damien Walter, who can't even compose a well written newspaper article, but has a grant from the Crown for a book he hasn't finished yet.

I'll do my own reading, thank you, review what I want to, and watch as the Big 5 collapse. Oh, Baen will keep one open, but only as a printing company. Castalia House is doing two books almost every month, and that will likely increase by the end of the year.

When you play Social Justice, the world loses.

Quick Kickstarter Post

Firstly, a couple of interesting games, one of which is in its last day.

Final Act- This is a 2player tank warfare game, designed by a tank commander. This looks pretty cool, and while I'm not backing it(I have plenty of good 2player games), some of my readers might.

Word Domination- I'm recommending this because of the hybrid play involving a word game and a risk like game. If you have friends/loved ones that like word games, but not games with lots going on, this could be a good middle ground for you. In the same vein as Paperback, which I find in some ways to be one of the most interesting deck building games.

Some reading materials covered before(I haven't seen anything new that looked as interesting):
Cirsova magazine is still a bit shy of its funding level for issues 3 and 4. This is good stuff, and I'm wanting to get more of "My Name is John Carter". Good, solid, regressive SFF here.

Starship Grifters by Robert Kroese is going to get expanded, which is good news. The more entertaining SFF succeeds, the more we'll get, and this is top notch parody SFF.

I'm not telling anyone to back a project, but there is some interesting stuff here, and I think it deserves a look.


When you play Social Justice, the world loses.

Music blog: Arch Enemy- You Will Know My Name

To the gaining of enemies:

 
Because Conan knew a bit about what is best in life.




To my haters: If you actually read my game articles, you'd know that I'm fighting for boardgames and tabletop gaming in general; I don't do much video gaming, and there are those better capable than I on that subject already in the fight.

When you play Social Justice, the world loses.

Music blog: Sting(with Edin Karamazov)- Flow my Tears

Due to personal issues, I'm really not up for writing today. Some cathartic music for the soul. Some don't like Sting on these, but I dig it, as lutenists would be breathing smoke and have a rougher voice than our modern classical and madrigal singers.

Trigger Effect: The Pre-Persons

Since I have the attention of SocJus fans for now, I thought I'd trigger a few by lauding one they mistakenly consider a hero: Philip K. Dick. Yes, the man was a drug addled libertine. He never argued against paying the cost for the things he did. He also was wholeheartedly against abortion. They don't want to admit that for one instance, or wave it away, saying "We know better".

NONSENSE!

PKD wrote a story that is sadly looking more and more prescient as so called moral philosophers have been advocating for post birth abortion, and most Christian nations have abandoned their faith.

This story is called "The Pre-Persons", and can be found collected in The Eye of the Sibyl and other classic stories. It's likely collected in other places too, but that's where I have it. In this story, women run the world, men need permission to leave the country, and children can be aborted until age 12. Abortion is seen as desirable and good, and food stocks are apparently limited. Children live in fear of vans that look like ice cream trucks, and run in terror of the Good Humor man. Children need to be licensed as desirable, or they are considered strays.

A few thoughts: This is written from a Malthusian view, likely one that comes into being when men no longer lead and have no incentive for research. The fathers in this story are indeed weak, but are smart enough and strong enough to know they should attempt escape with their sons. As I cannot comprehend any attraction to a woman that would have an abortion, even further is the comprehension of a woman that would get turned on by killing her own children. You think that life is not precious? Why must you be a hypocrite and continue to live? Why must there be such expense and legal obstacles for people trying to adopt?  Philip K. Dick may have been drug addled, but he knew how to tell a story, and he's very much right on abortion; it can't be an arbitrary standard.

To those imbecilic SJWs that think I would need to Google some of Neil's titles, why do that when I have a shelf full of his prose? What, you had to Google the Little Gold Book of Ghastly Stuff? I didn't even mention the window into his life that is Angels and Visitations or the lacking slipshod piece that is Interworld. You don't understand what a bibliophile does: when we find an author we like, we tend to get a lot of their work, especially when they're easy to read. I never said Gaiman was pro-Christian, just that he wasn't anti-Christian or conservative in the past, which is true. You f'n love
Science? Good. Go read Ascent to Orbit by Arthur C. Clarke; I did that in high school, you sycophantic prophylactic covered cowards.

When you play Social Justice, the world loses.