Dusk Before the Dawn

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The 2013 HUGO Voter Packet: Why Would You Not Do This?

The 2013 Hugos are awards for excellence in the field of science fiction and fantasy. The Hugos are awarded each year by the World Science Fiction Society, at the World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon). This year that convention is LoneStar Con 3 in my hometown of San Antonio, Texas August 29 – September 2.

Voting is only open to members of LoneStar Con 3 (71st Worldcon).

To be a supporting member is 50 bucks. And not only does this allow you to vote, but you also get the “Hugo Voter Packet“.

…which contains the five nominated novels (in various formats), all of the graphic novels and several other of the nominated works for novella, novelette, short story, works from those authors nominated for the Campbell award….

As with my post for last year, i have two major points:

• why would you not do this, given the price of all of the novels alone combined?
• vote for SFSignal for Best Fanzine and Best Fancast (full disclosure: I occasionally participate in both of these wonderful sites and podcasts)

The Hugo group should be applauded for this most excellent bribery to get people to read the nominated works and voted from the experience of reading, not from the reputations of the authors. This is done with a lot of trust (a fact that is pointed out, as it should be, in several places in the packet and on the website) and with the suggestion that readers support the authors who have contributed their works.

I do not normally follow or worry about the awards given out, as many of them are popularity contests (only 1,343 valid ballots were cast for the 2013 Hugo nominees). But this is an excellent investment, and a great way to participate.

I’ve included some simple math in a table below. Fifty bucks is a lot of money, but there is a ton of material in here.

The big question, as always, is: how much will get read before the voting deadline of July 31st?

TITLE	AUTHOR	KINDLE PRICE	PAPERBACK PRICE	PUBLISHER
2312	Kim Stanley Robinson	9.99	9.00	Orbit
Blackout	Mira Grant	7.59	8.99	Orbit
Captain Vorpatril's Alliance	Lois McMaster Bujold	9.99	10.58	Baen
Redshirts	John Scalzi	7.99	11.47	Tor
Throne of the Crescent Moon	Salidin Ahmed	9.99	10.87	DAW
	TOTALS	45.55	50.91

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Stars and Sleeping by the Colorado River

It’s been a little more than a week since my friends and I came out of the Grand Canyon. But I still wake up at night looking for the stars.

Many of us wake up in the middle of the night worrying about life, and trying hard to go back to sleep.

For five nights in May, when something woke me on my blue cot on some sandy beach beside the Colorado River, I tried very hard to stay awake…to look at the stars and the Universe in all its glory.

I live outside of Houston, and look up at Orion’s Belt, faint in the sky. But in the Canyon, the stars of the constellations are brighter than streetlights in a neighborhood. The Little Dipper was our constant nighttime companion, but it was not alone, surrounded by more stars than I can see anywhere else I’ve been in the world.

When I’m in the Canyon, I miss my wife…I dislike the sand…I long for beer other than Coors (!).

When I’m out…I miss the stars and waking up in the middle of the night to see the galaxy above me.

The 2013 Grand Canyon Star Party is on the South Rim June 8-15.

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How United counts on-time flights

Houston is a United hub so to get anywhere we fly United. Our only other option is to drive 90 minutes south to the other airport to take Southwest. Sometimes we feel like the drive might be worth it, especially in the months after the United-Continental merger. Flights were chronically delayed, and it seemed like the airline personnel were not happy about the merger.

United HAS gotten better. But flight delays are a frequent problem. According to the US Government’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (click here, select United, look at the table on the bottom right), United’s OnTime percentage for Departures from March 2012 – February 2013 was 76%, ranking them 15th of the carriers with revenues over $20 million…that’s close to the bottom.

My recent experience is much worse than that. Of my last four flights (all between IAH and TPA), the on-time percentage is 25%. Yes, only one out of my last four flights was on time. And, yes, when United sends me those surveys after each flight, I tell them this is the best way to keep customers: on-time flights. Nothing else is more important.

Curiously, on my last flight out of Houston, it appears that United was “gaming” the on-time statistics. Via United’s nice little mobile app, you can see my flight delay.

As you can see from the screenshot, the flight was about 50 minutes delayed. Further, it helpfully says it was delayed because the plane was late coming from the previous hop. The app has a great feature that allows you to check on the previous flight (“Where is this plane coming from?”). It is helpful, as it lets you know if the plane is truly delayed (you can tell if the previous flight is in the air) or if it is indeed in danger of being cancelled (the plane hasn’t left yet and is quite delayed).

I followed that link, and to my surprise, it stated that not only was the in-bound flight that my “delayed” flight was waiting on “on-time” but it was slated to arrive early.

How exactly does this work? The inbound flight is scheduled to land at 8pm, which is 19 minutes after my flights schedule departure.

Perhaps they cancelled the inbound flight and redirected a different flight to re-use the aircraft? Uncertain. I was at the airport earlier than usual due to concerns with the air traffic controller layoff, and all I saw was a gate change…and these very strange statistics.

I’m assuming that United counted this as one delayed flight and one on-time, but it still begs the question about how the previous flight was scheduled to arrive later than my flight was to depart.

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The Walking Dead and Downton Abbey: Season 3 coincidences

After watching season three of both The Walking Dead and Downton Abbey (yes, I watch it with my wife; admit it, you do too), my brain has picked up on some strange connections? Coincidences? Shared writers? They are both somewhat science fiction, aren’t they?

	THE WALKING DEAD	DOWNTON ABBEY	Commentary
Theme	Zombies want to be treated as equals to the living...or else eat them. Yeah, equality. That's what they want. Or maybe some salt.	The servants want to be treated as equal to the manor-born...or else eat with them.	There's always social upheaval between the classes.
Good-looking Blonde Needlessly Killed off in Season 3 finale	Andrea	Matthew Crawley	Contract didn't last past season three, hmmmm? And Andrea's role continues in the graphic novels (which is a cool word for comic book) My wife says he's good looking...honest!
Mother needlessly killed off in season 3	Lori	Lady Sybil	Another contract issue? Or both needing to setup a future story line?
Leading Man's Leadership is Questioned	Rick	Lord Granthem	Rick is seeing visions of his dead wife, hearing voices...normal stuff. Lord Grantham is making bad investments. bad business decisions and choosing the wrong doctor...normal stuff. And for this their leadership gets questioned? No slack?
Main buildings	The Prison	Highclere Castle	Both are in need of some repair. And both are prisons for some (whoa! Philosophical time-out)
Haves	The walkers	Lord and Lady Granthem and Family	Both groups have everything they want, including someone to feed them.
Have-nots	The walkers	The walked -on	If only there wasn't a caste system, a sense of class differentiation...oh, look....brains.
Who would win a race (or a cricket match!) between...	The walkers	The Crawleys	The Crawleys could at least get their servants to race for them.
Old person in cast who for some reason is still alive	Herchel	Dowager Countess	Despite immobility (both need canes), grey hairs and advanced years, they keep livin' while those around them are dyin'. Must have good contracts.

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The Civil War by Shelby Foote – V1.Chapter 6: The Sun Shines South

As I’m reading Shelby Foote’s incredible The Civil War: A Narrative, these are my notes on the points I may have forgotten from before or new pieces I’ve learned. Any and all comments appreciated.

Previous post - Chapter 5

Volume One: Chapter 6

1. Lincoln Reappraisal; Emancipation
2. Grant, Farragut, Buell
3. Bragg, K. Smith, Breckinridge
4. Lee vs. Pope: Second Manassas

Trouble at the top in the North

• From page 526: “For four months now, ever since the abrupt relief of McClellan back in March, the overall conduct of the war had been directed by Lincoln and Stanton – a sort of two-headed, four-thmbed amateur – with results just short of disastrous in the theater which had received their main attention. Stonewall Jackson, for example, had frightened Stanton and decoyed Lincoln into breaking up the combinations McClellan had designed for taking Richmond: so that Davis and Lee, professionals both, had been able to turn the tables on the Army of the Potomac, effecting counter combinations that drove it headlong to the ordinate commanders – on the one hand, Fremont’s ineptness; on the other, McClenllan’s lack of aggressive instincts- but most of it lay with the overall direction, which had permitted the enemy to bring pressure on those flaws.”"

Delaying the Emancipation Proclamation

• Differing opinions in Lincoln’s cabinet
• From page 540: “Then Seward spoke, having turned the matter over in hid mind. “Mr. President,” he said, “I approve of the proclamation, but I question the expediency of its issue at this juncture. The depression of the public mind, consequent upon our repeated reverses, is so great that I fear the effect of so important a step. It may be viewed as the last measure of an exhausted government, a cry for help; the government stretching forth its hand to Ethiopia, instead of Ethiopia stretching forth her hands to the government. It will be considered our last shriek on the retreat. Now, while I approve of the measure, I suggest, sir, that you postpone its issues until you can give it to the country supported by military success, instead of issuing it, as would be the case now, upon the greatest disasters of the war”.”

McClellan sees the writing on the wall; he is asked to “withdraw his troops from the Peninsula” where he is besieging Richmond from the east and southeast.

• Continuing delays and requests for reinforcements leads to his demise.
• from page 594: “Halleck was amazed, and went to Lincoln with the problem. Lincoln was not amazed at all. In fact, he found the telegram very much in character. If by some magic he could reinforce McClellan with 100,000 troops today, he said, Little Mac would be delighted and would promise to capture Richmond tomorrow; but when tomorrow came he would report the enemy strength at 400,000 and announce that he could not advance until he got another 100,000 reinforcements.”

And then, after Stonewall Jackson whips his replacement (Pope), McClellan is given the reins again

• from page 649: “So he went to him and told him to return to the army whose wounded were already beginning to pour into the city. And that afternoon, despite the howls of the cabinet – Stanton was squelched but Chase was sputtering, “I cannot but feel that giving command to McClellan is equivalent to giving Washington to the rebels” – Lincoln had Halleck issue the formal order: “Major General McClellan will have command of the fortifications of Washington and of all the troops for the defense of the capital.” This left Pope to be disposed of, which was done three days later. “The Armies of the Potomac and Virginia being consolidated,” he was told by dispatch, “you will report for orders to the Secretary of War.” Reporting as ordered, he found himself assigned to duty against the Sioux, who had lately risen in Minnesota. From his headquarters in St. Paul, where he was settled before the month was out, Pope protested vehemently against the injustice of being “banished to a remote and unimportant command.” But there he stayed, for the duration.

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Skull Island by Will Murray reviewed at SFSignal.com

My review of Skull Island, the new Doc Savage novel by Will Murray, was posted recently at the Hugo-award-winning SFSignal.com.
An excerpt:

REVIEW SUMMARY: Pulp legends collide as Doc Savage encounters King Kong shortly after World War I, augmenting the history of Doc Savage.

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: Called upon to take care of King Kong’s body after his fall from the Empire State Building, Doc Savage recounts to his aides the story of his first meeting with Kong, shortly after World War I when he and his father were searching the southern seas for Doc’s grandfather.

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Adds to the origins and background of Doc Savage and features a younger, still maturing, more complex Doc; and it has Kong! And DeVito art of Kong!
CONS: Would have enjoyed seeing more of Kong; and more DeVito art of Kong!
BOTTOM LINE: Near the 80th anniversary of both King Kong and Doc Savage, this novel is a well-paced look at a younger Doc Savage, uncertain of his future, uncomfortable in his relationship with his father, and searching for a grandfather he barely knows. This “origin” story provides a more complex Doc Savage than other novels, and can be enjoyed by Savage zealots (guilty!) and neophytes alike. Kong’s portrayal is true to DeVito’s Kong: King of Skull Island, and more Kong is the main thing I would ask of this novel.

[For newbies: check out A Doc Savage Primer and this list of all of the Doc Savage novels]

 

In 1933, King Kong escaped his captors and climbed to the top of the Empire State Building, where warplanes repeatedly attacked him and ultimately toppled him to his death on the ground below.

In the same time period, Doc Savage was making his name, traveling the world with his five aides, battling evil and doing good. His headquarters was in a high floor of a never-named office building, which could have been the Empire State Building.

This review could have been titled When Two Pulp Legends Collide, but I wasn’t sure if readers would think the title referred to Doc Savage and King Kong or Will Murray and Joe DeVito. Murray is the most recent incarnation of Kenneth Robeson, the “house name” for the authors of Doc Savage starting with Lester Dent. He penned the last seven books of the Bantam series of Doc Savage novels in the early 90s and has most recently resuscitated Doc Savage with his “Wild Adventures of Doc Savage” series. Joe DeVito has illustrated many books and magazine covers in the worlds of science fiction, fantasy and pop culture, and is the creator ofKONG: King of Skull Island.

Together they have created not only a legend-meets-legend novel, but added more to the origin story and canon of Doc Savage, enough of a departure from the original Doc Savage series that instead of the normal “Kenneth Robeson” by-line, Murray’s name is on the cover.

The novel is a post-World War I story wrapped around events just after Kong falls from the Empire State Building. Doc is tasked by officials with the disposal of Kong’s body, during which time he reveals to his aides (three of the five – Monk, Ham and Renny, as was the norm with many of the later Doc Savage novels) that he has known King Kong before.

The main story is told in three parts:

• Doc and his father, Clark, Sr., as they sail the seas in search of Doc’s grandfather, the legendary Stormalong Savage;
• finding and exploring Skull Island; and
• Doc and the others encountering King Kong.

The “origin” facts alone (including the existence of Stormalong Savage) veer sharply from those set forth in the Philip Jose’ Farmer “Wold-Newton Universe” (which strives to link many fictional characters in a lineage started when a radioactive meteor landed in Wold Newton, England and caused mutations that affected a large cross-section of many fictional universes). If interested, see the Doc Savage Wold-Newton chronology here. There has been some interesting (and some less-than-interesting) banter in the various Doc Savage and Wold Newton Universe forums on which version of Doc is correct or should be considered “canon” (isn’t this like arguing which fiction is more…non-fiction?) Both are great world building, and, c’mon, there’s been so many Marvel and DC Universe’s that only uber-geeks can keep track (or want to). If push came to shove, I’ll listen to Murray, who has written as Kenneth Robeson and represents Lester Dent’s (the original Kenneth Robeson) heirs. Farmer also contributed to the Doc Savage world by writing Escape from Loki, (the original Doc Savage “origins” novel showing Doc in World War I, meeting his five aides for the first time) and Doc Savage: His Apocalyptic Life, a fictional biography of a fictional character.

And now, back to our story…

Read the entire review here.

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The Civil War by Shelby Foote – V1.Chapter 5: Fighting Means Killing

As I’m reading Shelby Foote’s incredible The Civil War: A Narrative, these are my notes on the points I may have forgotten from before or new pieces I’ve learned. Any and all comments appreciated.

Previous post – Chapter 4

Volume One: Chapter 5

1. Davis Frets; Lincoln-McClelland
2. Valley Campaign; Seven Pines
3. Lee, McC: The Concentration
4. The Seven Days; Hezekiah

“The first national conscription law in American history”

• From page 394: “Under the influence of Lee, Davis proposed more stringent measures on a larger scale. In a late-March message to Congress he recommended outright conscription, within the same age bracket throughout the Confederacy – to make sure, he said that the burden of fighting did no fall ‘exclusively on the most ardent and patriotic’. Congress debated hotly, then on April 16, after lowering the upper age limit to thirty-five, passed the first national conscription law in American history. They passed it because the knew if was a necessity but they blamed Davis for having made it necessary by adopting the ‘dispersed defensive’, which they said had dampened nation enthusiasm. His reply – that ‘without military stores, without the workshops to create them, without the power to import them, necessity not choice had compelled us to occupy strong positions everywhere to confront the enemy without reserves’ – did nothing to assuage the anger of the States Righters, who saw in conscription a repudiation of the principles for which the war was being fought.”

McClelland continues to frustrate Lincoln by his inaction

• From page 414: “Amazed to find that McClelland had made mo provision for the capture of Norfolk, outflanked by the drive up the opposite bank of the James, the President decided to undertake the operation himself, employing the fortress garrison under Major General  John E. Wool….As things turned out, no push or support was needed. The Confederates had evacuated Norfolk the day before, leaving only a handful of men behind to complete the wrecking of Gosport Navy Yard.”

Robert E. Lee is given command

• Johnston wounded in the battle at Seven Pines, Smith is sick “…not from any ordinary fear but from the strain of responsibility suddenly loaded on his shoulders.”
• From page 450: “The two men road in silence under a sickle moon. Davis was making his choice. If he hesitated, there is little wonder. His companion was the obvious candidate; but he could easily be by-passed. David, knowing better than anyone how well Lee had served in his present advisory capacity, could as logically keep him there as he kept Samuel Cooper at the Adjutant General’s post….Nevertheless, by the time the lights of beleaguered Richmond came in sight David had made his decision. In a few words lost to history, but large with fate for the two riders and their country, he informed Lee that he would be given command of the army known thereafter as the Army of Northern Virginia.”

Stonewall Jackson rides again

• To relieve some of the pressure on Richmond with a feint north
• From page 464: “Application of these strategic principals, plus of course the blessing of Providence – particularly in the form of such meteorological phenomena as cloudbursts and hailstones large as hen-eggs – had enabled Jackson, with 17,000 troops, to frustrate the plans of 60,000 Federals whose generals were assigned the exclusive task of accomplishing his destruction. Four pitches battles he had fought, six formal skirmishes, and any number of minor actions. All had been victorious, and in all but one of the battles he had outnumbered the enemy anywhere from two- to seventeen-to-one….Mostly this had been done by rapid marching. Since March 22, the eve of Kernstown, his troops had covered 646 miles of road in forty-eight marching days. The rewards had been enormous: 3500 prisoners, 10,000 badly needed muskets, nine rifled guns and quartermaster stores of incalculable value. All these things he could hold and look at, so to speak. An even larger reward was the knowledge that he had played on the hopes and fears of Lincoln with such effect that 38,000 men – doubtless a first relay, soon to have been followed by others – were kept from joining McClelland in front of Richmond.”

Confederate artillery again no match for Federal

• In the Seven Days. From page 512: “Half an hour was all the needed. By 2:30, with the whole Union position still billowing smoke and coughing flame – one six-gun battery near the center, for example, fired 1300 rounds in the course of the afternoon – not a single Confederate piece with a direct line of fire remained in action. What had been intended as a preliminary bombardment had been reduced to a bloody farce.”

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The Civil War by Shelby Foote – V1.Chapter 4: War Means Fighting….

As I’m reading Shelby Foote’s incredible The Civil War: A Narrative, these are my notes on the points I may have forgotten from before or new pieces I’ve learned. Any and all comments appreciated.

Previous post – Chapter 3

Volume One: Chapter 4

1. Pea Ridge; Glorieta; Island Ten
2. Halleck-Grant, Johnston-Beauregard: Shiloh
3. Farragut, Lovell: New Orleans
4. Hallech, Beauregard: Corinth

High confederate hopes in the West…

• From page 293: “Believing in his Union days that the nation’s destiny pointed south and west, he [Jefferson Davis] had engineered the Gadsden Purchase and even imported camels in an attempt to solve the sandy transportation problem.”
• Same page: “…Control of the former would establish sound financial credit on which the South could draw for securing war supplies abroad, while the opening of Confederate ports along the Pacific Coast would insure their delivery by stretching the tenuous Federal blockage past the snapping point. Satisfying as all this was as a solution to present problems, an even more dazzling prospect still remained. Having forged its independence in the crucible of war, the new nation could then return to the old southern nationalist dream of expansion, acquiring by purchase or conquest the adjoining Mexican states of Chihuahua, Sonora, and Baja California. After these would come others, less near but no less valuable: Cuba, for instance, then Central America, and all that lay between. Van Dorn seizing St. Louis as a base for a march through Illinois to subdue the Middle West, Beauregard dictating peace terms in the White House after the Battle of Cleveland or Lake Erie – glorious as these scenes were to contemplate in the mind’s eye, they were pale indeed in contrast to the glittering light of victory by way of California.”

But Sibley could not defeat the Federal army between the Rio Grande and Albuquerque.

May 4: “As far as New Mexico and the Far West were concerned, the Civil War was over.”

Battle of Shiloh: the numbers just got distressingly large, and it is only April, 1862

• From page 350: “Union losses were 1754 killed, 8408 wounded, 2885 captured: total, 13,047 – about 2000 of them Buell’s. Confederate losses were 1723 killed, 8012 wounded, 959 missing: total 10,694. Of the 100,000 soldiers engaged in this first great bloody conflict of the war, approximately one out of every four who had gone into battle had been killed wounded or captured. Casualties were 24 percent, the same as Waterloo’s. Yet Waterloo had settled something, while this one apparently had settled nothing. When it was over, the two armies were back where they started, with other Waterloos ahead. In another sense, it settled a great deal. The American volunteer, whichever side he was on in this war, and however green, would fight as fiercely and stand as firmly as the vaunted veterans of Europe.”
• From page 351: “The battle losses were another matter, providing some grim arithmetic for study. Total American casualties in all three of the nation’s previous wars – the Revolution, the War of 1812 and the Mexican War: 10,623+6765+5885 – were 23,273. Shiloh’s totaled 23,741, and most of them were Grant’s.”

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The Civil War by Shelby Foote – V1.Chapter 3: The Thing Gets Under Way

As I’m reading Shelby Foote’s incredible The Civil War: A Narrative, these are my notes on the points I may have forgotten from before or new pieces I’ve learned. Any and all comments appreciated.

Previous post – Chapter 2         Next post – Chapter 4

Volume One: Chapter 3

1. The West: Grant, Fort Henry
2. Donelson – The Loss of Kentucky
3. Gloom; Manassas Evacuation
4. McC moves to the penisula

First Army/Navy cooperation occurs on a river?

• From page 183: “In the lead were four ironclad gunboats, unlike any ever seen before on this or any river.”
• From page 184: “The turtle-back steamers were not a navy project, the admirals left such harebrained notions to the army. For the most part, even the sailors aboard the boats were soldiers…Once the fleet was launched and manned, however, the navy saw its potential and was willing to furnish captains for its quarterdecks. Having made the offer, which was quickly accepted, the admirals did not hold back, but sent some of their most promising officers westward for service on the rivers.”

Initial victories by U.S. Grant (Hiram!)

•  Grant takes Fort Henry and Fort Donelsom (with the help of navel river bombardment the first time, and with little bloodshed the second time)
• The Confederate armies retreat out of Kentucky
• From page 196: “The congressional appointment had identified him as Ulysses Simpson Grant, when in fact his given name was Hiram Ulysses, but rather than try to untangle the yards off red tape that stood in the way of correction – besides the risk of being nicknamed “Hug” – he let his true name go and took a new one: U. S. Grant.”

understanding Lincoln

• Having just seen the movie Lincoln, this passage parallels the portrayal of the President as a man who has loyalties only to the cause of saving the Union and putting an end to slavery.
• From page 247-248: “That was something else he never understood: Lincoln himself. Some might praise him for being flexible, while others called him slippery, when in truth they were both two words for just one thing. To  argue the point was to insist on a distinction that did not exist. Lincoln was out to win the war; and that was alone was out to do, for the president would keep his word to any man only so long as keeping it would help to win the war. If keeping it meant otherwise, he broke it. He kept no promise, anyhow, any longer than the conditions I under which it was given obtained. And if any one thing was clear in this time when treason had become a household word, it was that the conditions of three months ago no longer obtained. McCellan would have to go forward or go down.”
• At this point, Lincoln unilaterally put forth General War Order No. 1, stating that a forward movement would be launched on February 22, much to McCellan’s chagrin.

 

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The Civil War by Shelby Foote – V1.Chapter 2: First Blood; New Conceptions

As I’m reading Shelby Foote’s incredible The Civil War: A Narrative, these are my notes on the points I may have forgotten from before or new pieces I’ve learned. Any and all comments appreciated.

Previous post: Chapter 1          Next post: Chapter 3

Volume One: Chapter 2

1. Manassas – Southern Triumph
2. Anderson. Fremont. McClellan
3. Scott’s Anaconda; the Navy
4. Diplomacy: the Buildup

Many early victories for the South, first taste of battle always difficult

From page 93: “Few of the romantic preconceptions as to brilliant maneuver and individual gallantry were realized. Fighting at close quarters because of the short-ranged Confederate flintlocks and muzzle-loading fowling pieces, a regiment would walk up to the firing line, deliver a volley, then reload and deliver another, continuing this until it dissolved and was replaced by another regiment, which repeated the process, melting away in the heat of that furnace and being in turn replaced. No fighting anywhere ever required greater courage, yet individual gallantry seemed strangely out of place. A plume in a man’s hat, for example, accomplished nothing except to make him a more conspicuous target. Nor did the rebel yell ring out on the banks of Wilson’s Creek. There was little cheering on either side; for a cheer seemed as oddly out of place as a plume. The men went about their deadly business of firing and reloading and melting away in a grim silence broken only by the rattling crash of musketry and the deep roar of guns, with the screams of the injured sometimes piercing the din. Far from resembling panoplied war, it was more like reciprocal murder.”

Confederate States had no Navy

• Early on, three ports taken using mostly naval power
• From page 120: “Some standard theories were going to have to be revised: the belief that one gun on land was equal to fou on water, for example. Steam had changed all that, removing the restrictions of wind and current and making possible such maneuvers as Du Pont’s expanding ellipse…Naval power was going to be a dominant factor in this war.”

Creation of the “loyal state of West Virginia”

Jeff Davis maintaining a policy of defense vs. aggression would pull in Europe on the side of the Confederacy

• From page 134: “His critics would have had him strip the troops from threatened points and send the marching forthwith against the North, staking everything on one assault. To Davis, this not only seemed inconsistent with his repeated claim that the South was merely defending herself against aggression, it seemed unnecessarily risk. That was the war might be quickly won, as Beauregard had pointed out; but it also might be quickly lost that way. Davis preferred to watch and wait. He believed that time was with him and he planned accordingly, not yet by any means aware that what he was waiting for would require a miracle. At this state, in Davis’ mind at any rate, nothing seemed more likely, more inevitable, than foreign intervention; as had been shown by his first action in attempting to secure it.”
• The capture of two Confederate enjoys from an English ship by a Union Naval officer almost succeeded in providing the necessary push, but cooler heads on both sides of the Atlantic prevailed.

Shelby Foote’s narrative is quite enjoyable

• From the Bibliography of this first volume (yes, some of us do read such things), he cites himself a novelist who combines the job of a historian.
• From page 815: “Accepting the historian’s standards without his paraphernalia, I have employed the novelist’s methods without his license. Instead of inventing characters and incidents, I searched the out – and having found them, I took them as they were. Nothing is included here, either within or outside quotation marks, without the authority of documentary evidence which I consider sound.”

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Updates

• While investigating the feasibility of a Kindle Fire version of my Grand Canyon app (which is available in the Apple App Store and about to have an update), found this excellent series of articles on developing for the Kindle Fire.     #