WELL, NONE OF THE THINGS THEY KEEP PREDICTING COME TRUE: No one is being put in camps, no legal immigrants are being thrown out because of being insufficiently white, women have not been ordered to go back home and make sammiches.  So all the left has is Stupid Outrage.

OH, PFUI, THAT’S NOT NEW:The hot new apartment amenity: sex.

READING DAVE FREER’S BOOKS IS AN HAZARDOUS UNDERTAKING: And not just because they’re written by a man who has been known to cuddle sharks professionally (never asked him if sharks are good tippers), go diving in rocky caves and/or climbing cliffs as if there weren’t perfectly good stairs, in perfectly good buildings, in perfectly good cities.  No.  The problem with reading Dave Freer’s books is that they grab and won’t let go.  On behalf of management I want to emphasize we are not responsible for lost sleep, whether or not it results in failed exams, chilly marital relations or any other ills.  And if some writers (okay me) start reading a Freer book on the plane to a conference, and can’t stop, so they (okay, me) end up reading the book under the panel tables and giving (even more) disjointed answers than usual to any questions, this is also NOT the management’s fault.

Oh, yeah, and Dave Freer’s Changeling’s Island is now in mass market paperback.  There is also, of course and still the handy dandy kindle edition.  You could be reading it in minutes.  Okay, maybe half an hour if Amazon is still stuttering.  Um… on second thought, wait till the morning to start reading.  Or you won’t sleep.  You’ve been warned. Management is NOT responsible.  Which is why the image below is a link.

COMEDY, THEY SAY.  IT’S LIKE FLASHBACKS TO GRADING MY STUDENTS’ PAPERS WHEN I TAUGHT ESL: How a Portuguese-to-English Phrasebook Became a Cult Comedy Sensation.  I need my grammar, and my stuffed eagle.

THREE WORDS: BOOBS, GUNS, BOOBS: Why this woman’s extremely boring videos still go viral

STATISTS APPALLED AND DISGUSTED:Deconstructing the Administrative State.

IF NOT YET, THEN SOON: Has Hollywood’s extreme liberal activism permanently damaged its appeal to Red State America?

DOESN’T MATTER; HE MUST BE A NARCISSIST BECAUSE HE DOESN’T FLATTER THEM:Trump references self 60 percent less than Obama in first joint session speech.

A REAL WOMAN:12 Margaret Thatcher quotes to start Women’s History Month the right way.

THE MOST IMPORTANT WORK ANYONE CAN DO:Media Perplexed: Four Children are “Work”.

DO THOSE WHO DON’T UNDERSTAND HOW WE GOT HERE DESERVE A VOICE IN WHERE WE’RE GOING? How Historical Illiteracy Fuels Political Polarization.

OF COURSE, IF EVERYBODY DID THIS? What happened when I stopped spending money for a whole year.

HOW LONG TO THE FORMATION OF ‘DOG LIVES MATTER’? This kitten is the NYPD’s friskiest officer.

THIS IS MY SHOCKED FACE:Obamascare: 60% of online Obamacare defenders ‘paid to post’ hits on critics.

HOW TRUMP’S ANTI-MEDIA-AUTHORITARIANISM CORRUPTED THE GERMANS! RETROACTIVELY! ELEVENTY! German secret service spied on journalists at the BBC, The New York Times and Reuters for more than a DECADE.

PERHAPS, BUT IN THE FORM THEY EXIST TODAY, THEY’RE REALLY JUST MARXISM AND THAT’S INDEFENSIBLE:Do the Humanities Deserve Defending?

WHEN YOU DON’T EXPECT TO EVER PAY, IT’S EASY TO RUN UP A RIDICULOUS TAB:Half of college students think their loans will be forgiven.

SHE HAS TO RUN.  INFLUENCE IS WHAT THE CLINTON’S PEDDLE:God help us if Chelsea Clinton runs for office.

OF COURSE THEY DO:EPA Employees Used Gov’t Purchase Card to Spend $14,985 on Fitness Memberships.

UNFORTUNATELY IN TERMS OF A FEDERAL BUDGET, THIS IS MONEY FOUND BEHIND SOFA CUSHIONS:  But this is still your tax dollars and not at work.  At least not on anything even remotely in the public interest.

IF THERE’S ONE THING W SHOULDN’T EVEN MENTION IS ANYONE’S HANDLING OF THE PRESS:George Bush Criticizes Trump.

SOME YEARS AGO, THE EXPERTS IN NEW YORK PUBLISHING: decided that “cozy mysteries” (mysteries like those of Agatha Christie, solved by amateurs, revolving around private relationships, and often involving eccentric characters) were passe.  Not that people didn’t want to read them, mind, but because people SHOULDN’T want to read them, because they were objectively bad.  Some books on how to write mysteries left cozies out altogether, save to tell you they shouldn’t be written because they’re not “real” mysteries.  Real mysteries are solved by professionals, and cozies weren’t nitty gritty and didn’t show class struggle.  Or something.  Anyway, they stopped accepting cozies.

This was before indie, but the market always finds a way.  There were readers for these mysteries (yours truly among others.  Yes, I also read police procedurals, but the mood for these kind of mysteries is different, and I’m not always in the same mood.  Just because I adore steak, doesn’t mean I don’t eat popcorn.) And so they found a new outlet in “craft mysteries” which were allowed to exist because the mystery was solved due to some specialized knowledge of a “craft.”

In the early 2000s due to a strange confluence of my publishing house at the time looking for someone to write craft mysteries and my kids needing shoes, I found myself more or less compelled to write three of these. (Mind you, the only thing even vaguely akin to a craft I’d had time for was furniture refinishing because… well, we needed furniture too.)  By the end of this, I had a good thing going with my science fiction at Baen and named an utterly unreasonable price to do a 4th book.  By that time, I had a strong idea that indie was viable, and I wanted this series cut off, and the books to revert, so I could continue the series indie.

It “only” took it close on ten years to revert, because these things — lighter than air, sillier than a sitcom — sell.  My heavens do they sell.

This is the first book in the series, the others will be coming out soon, and then I’ll finish the fourth.  To those keeping score at home, yes, it is set in the same town as my Shifter series at Baen, and some of the characters of each series have walk ons in the other.  Only the mystery characters aren’t aware of ANY supernatural stuff, which you know is what would happen.

Anyway, this is Dipped, Stripped and Dead.  You might love it.  You might hate it.  Or — more likely — it might while away an idle hour and amuse you.

(Of note, this is under a pen name, because it was demanded I do these under a “White Bread” name.  Apparently in New York Publishing, “Sarah Hoyt” is ethnic.  What can one do but say “Shine on, you crazy diamond.”?)

PRESENTING THE YOUTHFUL, ENERGETIC FACE OF THE PARTY OF DIVERSITY AND YOUTH WHO AS A MATTER OF COURSE OWNS THE FUTURE: Did we mention youth?  And Diversity?  And the Future?  I mean, that’s how they sell themselves, right?

BUT WHAT IF WE AREN’T ALL DEPLORABLE?  We Are Still ALL Deplorable.

YES, WE ARE ALL DEPLORABLE.  WEAR IT PROUDLY:How the ctrl-Left make it impossible to be a Nice Conservative.