Back almost thirty years ago, after The Soprano Sorceress was published, a small number of readers, and my then editor, the esteemed David Hartwell, thought that the name of one of the characters [Jimbob] was totally inappropriate. For the first three books of the series, Jimbob is a comparatively minor character, but in the fourth book he becomes the ruler of Defalk,

David insisted that Jimbob’s name change, and I did have Jimbob make the change, out of vanity, which certainly fit with Jimbob’s character. My wife, however, thought that the change was totally unnecessary, because of her family background in the mountains of Kentucky, where names such as Billy Joe and Billy Bob, Bobbi Jo are not uncommon. Also, where every farm animal (at least on her grandparents’ farm) has the salutation “ole,” as in Ole Barney (mule), Ole Jers (cow), Ole Butch (dog).

There’s also a personal connection, if attenuated, and a certain irony with David’s dislike of “Jimbob” (which actually exists as a given name in the U.S.). David’s full name is David Geddes Hartwell, which made him a second cousin of Alice Geddes Lloyd, the founder of Alice Lloyd College (given her name after her death) in Kentucky, an institution which provided a college education to my wife’s mother and many others who have double first names and who could not have attended college otherwise. By the way, my wife also has a double first name.

And history is certainly not without odd names, such as Robert Curthose (aka facetiously “Bobby Shortsocks”) who could have been king of England instead of Henry I; Astrolabe Abelard; Victory Birdseye; Styles Bridges; Bob Goodlatte; and many, many others.

Of course, for authors, odd-sounding names tend to fall into a category that might be termed “true but implausible,” where something that actually occurred is rejected by editors and readers as too implausible to be believable. At the same time, David’s objections notwithstanding, how can anyone who’s ever spent any time in the American South find a name such as Jimbob implausible (especially for a narcissistic ruler)?

Owning a house requires continuing maintenance, especially if you’ve lived in it for years. We’ve owned our present domicile over thirty years (the longest time either of us has stayed in one place), and during that time, the house has required repairs and replacements of items like the air conditioning compressor, dishwashers, washing machines and driers, as well as repainting and reroofing… and much more.

All this is obvious, but the need for such maintenance doesn’t apparently occur to far too many local, state, and federal officials. The amount of foregone maintenance in the Forest Service and National Park system is staggering, yet the current administration’s present and proposed budgets for the National Park System only address (from what I can tell) less than ten percent of the more than $24 billion of unfunded maintenance requirements.

One GAO report found that DOD was only funding 57% of the necessary maintenance at twelve major military bases. Another GAO report found that 73% of all Air Force maintenance on Air Force aircraft was delayed, up from 31% in 2019.

This isn’t confined to the federal government. Here in Cedar City, roughly twenty years ago, the city built a civic theatre, which was badly needed. That theatre has been essentially booked solid a year into the future, but the city council underfunded maintenance, which resulted in major maintenance work requiring total closure of the facility for months.

The Utah state legislature appropriates funding for new buildings for state colleges and universities, but little or no funding for ongoing maintenance, one reason why the roof of the music building at SUU leaked copiously after any significant rainfall (rare as it is).

Everyone wants the newest whatever – from military aircraft to public buildings – but governments at all levels continue to ignore the maintenance requirements, which just might also have something to do with the problems aboard the Abraham Lincoln, not to mention the fact that the President’s maintenance requirements seem fixated on a ballroom, an unneeded triumphal arch, getting his name on the Kennedy Center, and of course, the slope of the White House helipad.

From now until September 3rd, Tantor is offering the audiobook version of the firsr Alyiakal novel — From the Forest — at a 60% discount.

Here’s the link:https://www.audiobooks.com/promotions/promotedBook/691547/from-the-forest?refId=262177

No matter what people claim, no one likes to admit that they were wrong or that they made a mistake. I can certainly understand that, but the lengths to which some people will go to avoid such an admission can be truly terrifying.

It’s even more terrifying when one of those individuals is the President of the United States and when tens of millions of people so believe in him that they also can’t admit he made a mistake. From what I’ve observed, Trump is psychologically incapable of admitting he made a mistake, and all the rhetoric and blame-gaming involving the reflecting pool fiasco and the continuing insistence that the Iranians want to “make a deal” are just the latest manifestations of that inability. His pronouncements that everything he does is “wonderful,” “beautiful,” “fantastic,” and the like are also symptomatic of the same mindset.

This mindset also leads to a raft of problems. If you can’t admit a mistake, you can’t fix it. You can only blame someone else. So “vandals” sabotaged the reflecting pool, and District Attorney Pirro “folded like an umbrella” when a federal judge pointed out that there was absolutely no evidence of vandalism. Since Trump awarded the no-bid contract to cronies, he can’t admit that it was a bad decision because that would mean he’s not infallible.

The same mindset applies to the 2020 Presidential election, or the felony convictions involving the Trump company’s misrepresentation of its financial condition, or the civil cases repeatedly finding him guilty of sexual abuse.

But instead of recognizing Trump’s inability to admit mistakes, tens of millions of Americans buy into his lies. Wanting to believe a President isn’t a fault, but failing to admit that the President has made mistakes and lied repeatedly is.

But whether those “true believers” ever will admit Trump has made mistakes and repeatedly lied is another matter.

The lead article in the latest edition of The Atlantic is entitled “The Age of Reading is Over.”

The article makes a quite persuasive case for that thesis, and for the sub-thesis that Americans in particular have been seduced by the ease of immediate electronic communication, instant on-demand electronic entertainment, computer/AI-assisted (if not largely/totally composed) schoolwork, technical analyses, books, and speeches.

Part of the reason for this, I’m convinced, is that Americans are far more interested in results than process, and failing to understand processes can result in unfortunate outcomes.

Reading itself is a process by which one perceives symbols based on or representing sounds of spoken language, and extracts their meaning to various ends, i.e., entertainment, obtaining personal or professional knowledge. Those symbols we read are also a means for preserving knowledge, data, and other information.

This process requires skill and active participation by the reader, unlike watching/listening to information or even entertainment presented visually/digitally. Today thirty percent of Americans cannot summarize a two-page document or explain what it means, up from less than 20% ten years ago.

But what happens when fewer and fewer people in a culture can actually read and understand the information?

We’re already seeing some of results from the decline in reading, including an ongoing decline in both non-fiction (you know, “factual” books) as well as declines in virtually all fiction except romantasy and fiction about dragons. From 1930 to 2000, the average IQ of Americans increased steadily. Since then, it has declined by three points a decade. American adults now have, on average, a smaller vocabulary than they did fifty years ago. At the same time, the ability of students to understand and analyze written work has declined, as has their ability to compose a coherent sentence and paragraph.

I’ve also noticed a decline in the ability to discern between lies and what is actually supported by verifiable facts (otherwise known as “truth”), and I suspect, but cannot prove, that readers are better at such discernment, primarily because readers can assimilate more information more quickly than viewers.

Not that verifiable facts make much difference to most people now that the age of reading is passing.