DShomshak

The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman. First of a series. A jolly romp about acqyiring rare books for an interdimensional library. Alternate histories, faeries, a Great Detective, steampunk London, vampires, dragons, and more fun. Not a serious bone in it, unless you count the suggestions of poisonous office politics among senior librarians, which suggests to me that Ms. Cogman once worked in the Tacoma Library System. (As my sister did for many years and I did... briefly.) The style is arch to just the right degree, in that way Brits do so well.
 
Possibly of interest to some readers that Ms. Cogman once wrote a fair bit of material for the Exalted RPG and ported a fair bit into the series. Her Fae, as creatures of primal Chaos, are ported directly from Exalted (OK by me since it's a view of Fae she had a large role in creating in the first place). I shall see if her version of dragons intersects with Exalted as well. Could be: In Exalted, dragons are powerful elemental spirits, and at one point a dragon wields elemental power.
 
We game writers are all frustrated novelists. It's nice to see that one of our crew made the transition so well.
 
Dean Shomshak

It's not hypocritical when you accept that the fundamental premise of conservatism is different rules for different people.
 
Dean Shomshak

Maps of the Galaxy, with greatest-ever content
 
GAIA Data Release 3

https://freakonomics.com/podcast/season-11-episode-41/
 
Discussion of social scientist's classic book Influence, newly reissued and expanded -- and highly relevant to our discussion of reason, emotion, and politics, because Cialdini's book is about the seven techniques used by everyone from salesmen to despots to manipulate us. These techniques work no matter how smart you think you are, but conscious awareness and wariness might at least give you a chance to resist.
 
Dean Shomshak

The June 4, 2022 issue of The Economist has some articles people might find interesting.
 
Cover story: Russia breaking the "Nuclear Taboo" with near-daily threats to use nuclear weapons, either in Ukraine or against Western countries. Even if nuclear weapons ultimately aren't used, just talking about it makes the danger greater that someone will use nukes, sometime, by treating it as a potentially feasible tactic -- especially if Russia seems to gain advantage from the mere threat. Leaders also must note that Ukraine gave up its share of the Soviet nuclear arsenal for security guarantees that turn out to be worthless. Now, Ukraine didn't have the industrial infrastructure to maintain those nukes, and it probably would have paid a high political price for doing so, so it still might have been the only reasonable choice at the time. But the leaders of every country with potentially troublesome neighbors must be thinking, "Huh, maybe I need a nuclear deterrent." This makes it vitally important, the article argues, that Russia lose hard in Ukraine, to establish that nukes are neither a Win Button nor even an Escape Geopolitical Consequences button.
 
Though the article also notes that the Nuclear Taboo may only have been held by policy elites. Many ordinary people in nuclear-armed countries think it's perfectly acceptable to use nuclear weapons on the battlefield if it would save lives of their own troops. (Presumably, of course, agaionst a foe who is not similarly armed.)
 
Disturbingly, the Russian ambassador who rec ently resigned over the Ukraine invasion claims that many Russian strategic policy people think, or claim to think, that Russia could achieve a quick and easy victor over the US by using nuclear weapons. Just drop a nuke on some small town in the US, and the cowardly Americans will drop to their knees and beg for mercy. The ambassador thinks they're insane.
 
For something completely different: Education as a way of coping with climate change. It's a truism that poor people in the Global South are the least responsible for climate change but are already suffering from it the most. Education ma not help them do anything to curb climate change, but it sure helps them deal with the effects by enabling them to improve their income, change how they farm or conduct animal husbandry, and -- not least -- just to know what's going on. The ignorant and illiterate stubbornly cling to the old, customary ways of doing things because they know nothing else and they have no margin for experimentation. Educated people gain just by knowing that things can and have been done differently, and how to find the information they recognize that they need.
 
The article particularly notes the powerful effects of educating girls and women. Doesn't say whether this is more effective than educating males, or if so, why, though I can imagine some reasons. But the gist is that of all the ways to raise the Third World out of poverty and create more resilient societies, education may give the greatest return on investment.
 
Dean Shomshak

The June 4, 2022 issue of The Economist has some articles people might find interesting.
 
Cover story: Russia breaking the "Nuclear Taboo" with near-daily threats to use nuclear weapons, either in Ukraine or against Western countries. Even if nuclear weapons ultimately aren't used, just talking about it makes the danger greater that someone will use nukes, sometime, by treating it as a potentially feasible tactic -- especially if Russia seems to gain advantage from the mere threat. Leaders also must note that Ukraine gave up its share of the Soviet nuclear arsenal for security guarantees that turn out to be worthless. Now, Ukraine didn't have the industrial infrastructure to maintain those nukes, and it probably would have paid a high political price for doing so, so it still might have been the only reasonable choice at the time. But the leaders of every country with potentially troublesome neighbors must be thinking, "Huh, maybe I need a nuclear deterrent." This makes it vitally important, the article argues, that Russia lose hard in Ukraine, to establish that nukes are neither a Win Button nor even an Escape Geopolitical Consequences button.
 
Though the article also notes that the Nuclear Taboo may only have been held by policy elites. Many ordinary people in nuclear-armed countries think it's perfectly acceptable to use nuclear weapons on the battlefield if it would save lives of their own troops. (Presumably, of course, agaionst a foe who is not similarly armed.)
 
Disturbingly, the Russian ambassador who rec ently resigned over the Ukraine invasion claims that many Russian strategic policy people think, or claim to think, that Russia could achieve a quick and easy victor over the US by using nuclear weapons. Just drop a nuke on some small town in the US, and the cowardly Americans will drop to their knees and beg for mercy. The ambassador thinks they're insane.
 
For something completely different: Education as a way of coping with climate change. It's a truism that poor people in the Global South are the least responsible for climate change but are already suffering from it the most. Education ma not help them do anything to curb climate change, but it sure helps them deal with the effects by enabling them to improve their income, change how they farm or conduct animal husbandry, and -- not least -- just to know what's going on. The ignorant and illiterate stubbornly cling to the old, customary ways of doing things because they know nothing else and they have no margin for experimentation. Educated people gain just by knowing that things can and have been done differently, and how to find the information they recognize that they need.
 
The article particularly notes the powerful effects of educating girls and women. Doesn't say whether this is more effective than educating males, or if so, why, though I can imagine some reasons. But the gist is that of all the ways to raise the Third World out of poverty and create more resilient societies, education may give the greatest return on investment.
 
Dean Shomshak

This sentence seems backwards.
 
Don't start by saying what something isn't. We have no expectations that must be contradicted, so this makes no sense.
 
Rivers generally empty into seas rather than seas into rivers. Is the Kulana River in fact an outflow from the Gefting Sea, on the way to some other body of water? If so, look for a way to briefly and gracefully remind the reader of this.
 
Dean Shomshak

And oh hey, I was looking for armory plans a while back and still have one on my desktops!

 
 

I think the academics who wonder why so many Russians back the invasion are overthinking. For millennia, it was perfectly normal for a stronger group to attack, conquer and pillage weaker neighbors. Successful conquering despots got labeled "the Great." Putin is just playing by the old rules, and the Russian people respond -- not b ecause they've suffered some special historical trauma, but because they *haven't* been raised in historically unusual safety, comfort, and Enlightenment ideology.
 
So for instance, of course Russian officers aren't trying to stop Russian soldiers from (as the article notes) sending stuff looted from Ukrainians home to their wives, who are grateful to receive them. Pillaging is traditionally part of why you go to war, no matter what international law says. It's a compensation leaders offer for soldiers' risking their lives.
 
Russians aren't strange for embracing Putin's war. We're strange for finding it strange that they do so. And I dare say that many Americans, Canadians, Australians, and other folk would act exactly the same way under similar circumstances. Condemning it is, arguably, intellectually elitist. But I'm okay with that. I consider the fundamental work of civilization to be making people treat each other better than comes naturally.
 
Dean Shomshak

And oh hey, I was looking for armory plans a while back and still have one on my desktops!

 
 

Skitter
 
Russell Tovey has six arms and the hands of each have a maw of razor sharp teeth in the palm. The teeth produce a poison that causes paralysis and thins the blood. He also has extra eyes grafted around his head giving him 360 degree vision. His favorite tactic is to use his hand mouths to cling to walls and then climb to a ceiling so he can drop on a victim. He then engulfs them in his powerful arms while poisoning and tearing them apart with his mouths. To go along with his disturbing appearance he has a creepy predatory personality and the unnerving habit of gnashing all of his teeth as he stares unblinking at you.

Squidra
 
A homeless man "living" in an abandoned fish canary, the man known now as Squidra was abducted and modified by The Great Beast as a test to see if a normal human could survive his modification process (so at one day he could use it himself). The man lost all hair, grew ten tentacles out of his body (four from his back, three from his chest, two attached to each thigh, and one from the back of his head), and a huge beak like mouth in his stomach area and an extra digestive pathway. He also gained limited "camouflage" invisibility and the ability to squirt an organic ink like liquid from his tentacles. For a while, he worked as The Great Beast's only human agent till he created the others in his preparation to achieve "godhood".
 
Squidra has reservations following The Great Beast, but stays with him because he ultimately has no where else to go. Forcently The Great Beast hasn't gotten so insane as to not treat his 'pets' well, and in the Great Beast's mind that includes Squidra. The Great Beast eventually plans on turning Squidra into a kaiju size behemoth...but that would involve tons of the wonder substance The Great Beast uses to create the modifications he uses.

Piecemeal 
 
Jennifer Rodriguez, VIPER agent Devlin Dare, and PRIMUS agent David Lee Jones were at the wrong place at the wrong time. All three got blown to bits during a VIPER bank heist when an explosion misfired. Somehow the Great Beast got a hold of the parts and fashioned a new body with psuedo-matter and pieces of each body. Piecemeal is a hulking man-shape with three heads, and the Great Beast uses it's body as a test bed for various animal type powers he might use on himself one day. All three personality fight for control, and all are bugging for their own body.
 
The Great Beast is pondering about elimination of Piecemeal and replacing it with another test bed creation. He loves all his pets, but some a little bit more.

Many Beaks Make Light Work
This creation is one of those that people have named via competitions on the Internet like Villain McVillainface. It's humanoid but covered in beaks. Bipedal and basically sexless. It does not seem to have any eyes or ears or olfactory organs but it can sense anything. All the beaks are the same and are of the same size. It can eat anything and is immune to poisons, gases, radiation, high pressure and temperature extremes. It can survive in space. It understands what is said to it and can reply in cheeps which the others can understand. The bites are not poisonous but any person attacked is subject to a multitude of bites. If someone was wearing a suit of armour like a knight of old, they would not be affected but other protections like forcefields would be eaten through. A force wall would keep it at bay.

Ok. It is still up to Death Trible, but I just got to do a number 6. So here comes...
 
Disgust.
 
Disgust was once an overweight gourmet restaurant critic named Arnold Denver. An upset restaurant owner had Arnold abducted and plotted to kill him over a bad review. The Great Beast bargained to have Arnold as a test subject and got his way. Arnold was given multiple stomachs, resistance to damage, and the ability to regurgitate a strong acid out of his mouth. Oh, and multiple mouths (more like food intake openings with long lamprey style teeth) all over his body. And a tounge which now acts like a tentacle in his head.
 
Arnold when not eating everything in sight (including stuff poisonous to others), he crys about his lack of being able to smell or taste anymore. Arnold also angers at fat jokes, othoe it is questionable if he even remembers what his shape use to be before being transformed. 

Villains being villains, they tended to be laid-back, laissez-faire parents.  So some of the kids will <gasp> want to be Heroes!!!!  While others will continue the family traditions.
 
Oh, the angst when the hero has to go after his villain girl friend.............

You might expect "The Demon Lords" to be a violent street gang or, perhaps, actual demons.
 
But, no, they're young nerdy supervillains inspired by the demon lords & princes of the 5th edition of the world's most popular tabletop RPG.
 
Aside from being obliged to use the name of a D&D demon like Demogorgon, Orcus,  or ... IDK, I can't spell the others that come to mind... anything goes. 

Vanish
 
Mike "Mickey" Huter was an ok-looking, slightly intelligent,  moderately athletic young man of good family who should have easily made something of himself.  But little Mickey was a sensitive boy, always picked on, never aplying himself, and his life spiraled into depression and misery.
He sought out the Great Beast thinking he could at least make a tasty snack for some monster rather than killing himself to no purpose at all.
Instead of being put out if his misery, he was subjected to psuedo-matter. 
Vanish is still basically humanoid, though everything about him looks subtly off, like an uncanny valley effect.  A third eye (on an extensible stalk) allows him to see through solid objects, and where he can see, he can go, without bothering about the points between.  His new flesh reacts to intense emotion by fading from view, then, in extreme cases, reality, becoming insubstantial.  He has no offensive powers - he can't teleport or re-solidify in someone to shock their system or anything, and his physical abnormalities don't include claws/fangs/tentacles/poison.
 
He's still miserable, of course.
 

How about some politics from this side of the Atlantic ?
They waited until after the Jubilee but there was a confidence vote in Boris's leadership from his own party. He won but
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-61714645
 
The confidence vote needed 15% of the MPs in the Conservative Party to inform the 1922 committee that they wanted the vote. That target was reached in part because of disgust at the lockdown parties he attended when he was telling the country no gatherings above 6 people and in part because of the reaction by constituents to the PM.