The Red Menace

The Red Menace
Image Copyright Publish America 2009

The Red Menace

"The Red Menace"

From the Jacket Blurb...

In the Fall of 1950, the United States entered into a conflict with aliens from an unknown world. This conflict was fought in the shadows, nobody wanting its existence to become public knowledge. At stake was the very future of humanity and its freedom from off-planet domination.

Harry Edgarton, a veteran of the Second World War, finds himself returning to his wartime duties as an Intelligence and Special Operations officer. He stumbles into alien activity and seeks out those already involved in the conflict to join their ranks. Putting together a team of military personnel, aided by the best scientists America has, Harry starts to investigate sightings of ‘flying saucers’, trying to determine what they want and how to stop them. Along the way, he must face human Quislings who have sold out humanity for a higher place in the new order to come, unimaginative law enforcement and military officials that obstruct his mission through incompetence, and the very flaws of American society and humanity itself.

Can Harry and his team, ‘Detachment Jericho’, divine the enemy’s plans in time to make a difference? Can they steal enough alien technology to give American and her Allies the weapons to keep the war from being a lopsided fiasco? Will American society as it is survive and prosper?

Coming soon to Barnes & Noble and Borders near you. (As of 6 March 2009)

I am an Author!

Well, it's taken five years to get to this point. I've revised my book no less than five times, based on input from various people, including some in the publishing industry I met at GenCon.

As it stands, I'm having to go with Publish America, a company that *does* publish books, but not in a traditional manner. I'll get a whopping $1 as an advance, to secure the contract, then for the next seven years, the book will be available on Amazon and where ever I can get a store to carry it. the only marketing that PA does is to send out review copies to certain magazines and reviewers, and press releases. Otherwise, it's print on demand and PA titles aren't stocked by mainstream book distributors.

That sucks, but it gets me an ISBN, which is a start. I will, though this blog, have discounted copies available, when the book goes to press. Right now, my book is still in the final stages of production, I'm waiting for my contract to arrive in the mail to sign it.


Monday, November 17, 2008

Veteran's Day dinner...

Well, tonight I had dinner at Golden Corral, their annual "Military Appreciation Dinner". I sat there with a friend of over 25 years, also veteran, surrounded by men and women - all of them complete strangers - with whom I shared one bond. We had all served in our nation's military.

There were veterans of the Second World War, Korea, Viet Nam, and the various conflicts of the Cold War, along with those, like me, who'd never heard a shot fired in anger. A guy off to one side had DJ equipment and was playing patriotic music and Boy Scouts were helping bus the tables for the overworked staff. I felt things I hadn't felt in a long time, a sense of belonging being one of them, and remembered things from my service over 20 years ago.

I thought about all these things, then I thought about the current debate over Iraq. Recently, I read a short biography of actor Henry Fonda. Fonda was something of a liberal, and was best friends with Jimmy Stewart. The two had shared an apartment twice in their years coming up in New York and Hollywood. In World War II, both enlisted. Stewart became an officer commanding bomber crews in the Army Air Corps, personally flying 20 official and an unknown number of off-the-books missions over Germany, including the October 14th, 1943 raid on Schwienfurt where roughly one plane in five didn't return. Fonda enlisted in the Navy and ended up an officer in an Intelligence billet in Hawaii.

Fonda and Stewart were best friends, yet Stewart was a staunch conservative and Fonda a liberal. But they were *not* the kind of conservative and liberal we see grabbing TV Air Time today. They could disagree and be friends. They didn't stage protests dressed up in idiotic colors claiming to "support the troops" while with the same breath denouncing the war those troops are fighting.

Here's my point, and if you are a "this war is illegal, impeach Bush" kind of liberal, pay attention.

You cannot denouce the war *and* support the troops. Pick one.

You see, while that would have worked in Viet Nam, it can't today. In the 60s, we had a conscipt army - the draft. Today's military is *all* volunteer. Everyone currently serving thier first term of enlistment volunteered *after* we went into Iraq and things didn't turn out as well as we'd have liked. That's over 3 million Americans that haven't voted at the ballot box in favor of freedom for Iraqis, but they've voted with their feet, risking thier very lives to bring freedom to people that have never known it.

I'll discuss with anyone whether or not we should have gone in. But now we are there and no matter what course we choose, there will be consequences. Pulling out, suddenly, before the job is done, is a slap in the face of all those who served in Iraq. And Henry Fonda would have agreed completely.

Scott Hann

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