rlfj: Blog

A quick finish for the last story. I commented on a note from a reader who had said that knowing serial numbers was a way for service members to tell who the Walts were. I stated that I didn’t know what that meant, but I understood the idea. Several readers wrote that a ‘Walt’ was a Walter Mitty, someone who pretends they have military service. For those curious, I am not a Walt. While I know a fair bit about the military, more than the average American, I have never served and never pretended I did. (My family would disown me. Almost all the men have served.) Many thanks.

Anyway, it’s time for a new story, Martian Vengeance. It covers the third invasion of Mars by WestHem, and features many of the characters from Martian Justice, plus some new faces. If you liked Martian Justice, you’ll love Martian Vengeance! Enjoy!

For those interested, the full story is on Bookapy. In addition, I created a combo book, pulling Martian Justice and Martian Vengeance into a single book. For the conspiracy theorists out there, no, I didn’t plan this as a way to maximize revenues. When I wrote Martian Justice my overwhelming concern was to be true to the vision and integrity of the universe created by Al Steiner. The same goes with Martian Vengeance. I didn’t even start thinking about the second book until I was halfway through publishing the first. Both stories had to be approved by Al before I could finalize them and post them. I can’t thank him enough for allowing me to add these stories to his universe and for the editing assistance he provided.

Got a note from a reader:

One very minor nit to pick: Callahan would still know his service number. If he said he didn't recall it, that would give Harlan Jones reason to question whether Callahan was who he said he was: no serviceman ever forgets his service number. And every other serviceman knows that; it's one of the ways we pick out the "Walts" out there.

Not sure what a Walt is, but I think I get the drift. Fixed.

Another fix was in city populations. At various points in the story I referred to the city and planetary populations. The other day I checked with Al and some of my numbers were wrong. I went through it again and fixed a few items. Fixed.

Chapter 29 is the finale of Martian Justice. I hope everybody enjoyed it. If you find any typos or errors, please send them to me. I will fix the chapters on SOL and fix the final version on Bookapy. I’ll load the final version next Friday.

This has been a wild ride and I hope everybody enjoyed it. Special thanks to Al for allowing me to take it.

For those curious, I have been working on a sequel to the sequel, so to speak. I am working with Al to make sure it meets with his requirements and standards. Figure I might start publishing sometime this spring.

Enjoy!

Lots of responses on whether to call a trench a ditch or vice versa. For simplicity’s sake, I made the defensive lines trenches and the offensive lines trenches. A couple of interesting responses:

From: Daragon - Actually, in history both terms were used. On the late western front in WW1, they had infantry trenches and antitank trenches, which were constructed the same way just wider, deeper, and sometimes with more than 90° angles on the sides so that tanks got stuck in the trench. There are reconstructed examples of both being shown in Verdun today. In WW2 the US forces used the distinction of trench and ditch to make identification easier, the British stuck to trench until the end of the war.

From: Dorothy - No idea if this is the same in the US as the UK but a ditch has sloping sides and will maintain its shape over time and a trench has vertical sides and is cut for a specific reason, then re-filled. For example, laying cables and pipes or even for the safety of troops.

I think we can lay this to rest, but I appreciate the info, I truly do.

An email came in specifying:

“A terminology issue -- I thought a trench was what the defending infantry were placed, and the anti-tank features were ditches. You have tanks getting stuck in trenches.”

I never thought about it before, but I had a lack of consistency in my terms. I edited the story and reposted Chapter 26, so that the defensive features were trenches and the anti-tank and anti-personnel features were listed as ditches. Thank you to upper for catching the problem.

For those of you who bought the book, many thanks. When I finish publishing the story on SOL, I will update the version on bookapy. You will then be able to download the final version. If anybody finds typos or other errors, make sure I know. Thanks.