rlfj: Blog

No, I'm not leaving any time soon. This is more a parting thought to Grim and Company. A few people commented on the Epilogue and how the family ended up. A little over the top? No! A lot over the top! Then again, most of the family was more than a bit above average. I decided to go big and go home! As for continuing the story, or writing small interlude pieces, sorry, but I just don't see that happening. It's time to stop.

Many thanks to all the kind readers who enjoyed this series. Your thoughts (and dollars!) are much appreciated. My wife thanks you as well, since she spends it!

Quite a few noticed that there were some major formatting problems in the last chapter and epilogue. No idea what happened, but the SOL system added a bunch of random paragraph breaks that weren't in the original html files. I spent many a year coding in html so I could read the code and find things that weren't in what I had uploaded. I had to regenerate the files and reload them. They look okay now.

Again, I can't thank my editors enough. I'm nowhere near smart enough to do this stuff on my own, especially since I've never served or been a cop. RSC got a lot of assistance from grynslvr2, jjmcdonald7911, pdkrause, and Old Rotorhead. I could never have done this without their assistance.

Quite a few readers wanted to know what I was doing next. It's going to be tough to come up with somebody as interesting as either Carl Buckman or Graham Reaper. Not sure I'm even going to try. I've been going through my archives, reviewing some stories that I started but never got around to finishing. Some of them have some real possibilities. I finished one, a short story, and I'll be putting it up sometime in August. I have two other strong contenders that I am still giving some thought to; they are going to take longer to sort out. I don't imagine I will be publishing them this year.

Major formatting problems in the last chapter, etc. Reloading, but it is taking some time to fix.

The Reaper Saga ends with this final chapter and the epilogue. It's been a long run, but it needs to end, and this seems a good point to do it. From what I've been hearing, everybody seems to like the way it's been going.

For the readers who want me to keep going, to tell Riley's story or Seamus' story, sorry, no. I was uncomfortable enough moving into the near future, 2020 to 2028. When I started writing nobody had ever heard of coronavirus, Black Lives Matter, or any of the other events we've seen this year. What strange events will happen in the future? And how can I even begin to wonder what will happen to the rest of the family in the next ten, twenty, forty years? What I wrote in the Epilogue pushes my imagination to the limits. I can imagine writing scifi set in the far future, but not in the immediate future.

Still don't know if we've been exposed to Covid-19. Still haven't heard yet whether we have it or not. Hopefully not. This is nuts. Thanks to everybody who sent their thoughts and prayers for my family with coronavirus. I've had two heart attacks so that's a comorbidity issue. I hope I still have a few years left.

Speaking of coronavirus, my wife works at a local grocery store. Last week she got assigned as a greeter, to tell people to wear masks. An old lady shopping with her grandkids came in without a mask. When my wife said she needed to wear one, she replied, no, she didn't need one, it was all nonsense. My wife replied she must not have known anyone who had it. The old lady answered that her sister had died of it, but she was old and had other diseases, so she was dying anyway. My wife just blinked and sent her inside. I can't make this shit up!

I had a reader respond and part of their comment included the term baited breath. Something didn't sound right, so I googled it. It actually refers to the words bated breath, which comes from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, and is an abbreviation of abated breath, to hold one's breath due to suspense. Odd, the things you latch onto.

Anyway, enjoy!

A common response to the last chapter: zero tolerance = zero common sense. True, so true, and yet so common. Unlike common sense, which is quite uncommon.

Covid-19 has hit our household. My youngest girl might have gotten it and is now scheduled to be tested. Forget about the 'anybody who wants a test can get a test' bullshit. Even in upstate New York it can take a week or more to get the results back. Since we visited them on Saturday, my wife and I might have it, so we just scheduled our own tests. That means we can't visit my mother this coming weekend, since she's 91 and quite susceptible. So much for our vacation plans. Don't email me saying this is a hoax.

Anyway, enjoy!

Chapters 35 and 36 show that Grim is like a delicious candy bar, with a hard coating and a soft gooey center. As for the idiocy described in 36, just watch your local news sometime. This nonsense shows up every few years. No reason Matucket shouldn't see it as well. Enjoy!