Foreword

In today’s political/social climate, there are members of a minority who think what they believe is what everybody should believe. They are the squeaky wheel in Western culture. Another minority, which I believe is much bigger than the squeaky-wheel minority, like to read books and stories or see films that mimic reality. All teenagers come of age, and the reality of it is they do that much earlier than eighteen. The squeaky wheel, however, want everybody to believe that nobody engages in sexual behavior until they are eighteen. They’d probably want there to be a law that you have to be married to have sex, too, but their voting block isn’t big enough to have that kind of influence. The first amendment to the US constitution says we all have the right to write books where teenagers under that age of eighteen have sex. It’s just the law, especially if the “under age” person is older than the legal age of consent in a given state. The screaming spokes of the squeaky wheel can’t do anything about it ... unless they weaponize civil law. What they can do is sue the publisher who publishes completely legal books which mimic reality and in which “under age” sex is involved. “Under age” is defined as under eighteen, in their world. They will lose that suit, but the publisher has to hire a lawyer to defend his rights. And when that suit gets thrown out of court, they’ll just sue again ... and again ... and again, until the publisher is bankrupted by legal fees. What would you do if you were a publisher? You’d want to stay in business. So, this book, which is fiction but originally mimicked reality, has been edited to prevent the publisher from being sued. Every character in this book who engages in sexual behavior is eighteen or older. In this case they’re two or three years older than the legal age of consent in most states. But the squeaky wheel doesn’t care about that. They only care that they get to crack the whip and the rest of us are supposed to fall in line. If they want to play legal games, then I will, too. If you like the book and would like to read the original version, which you have the legal right to do, instructions on how to do that at no additional cost to you. You and I can have a conversation which the squeaky-wheel, fascist- behaving, ignorant folks won’t be involved in.