I’m in the middle of editing a book. It’s hard work and I don’t have much time to read (I’m suppose to be editing my book not procrastinating).
So try The Lord Darcy series by Randall Garrett. I suggest ‘Murder & Magic’, Too ‘Many Magicians’, and Lord Darcy Investigates. These books were written in the 1960s, but feature and alternate history long before flood of current alternate history books. It also could be called Steampunk, but these books were written before Steampunk was thought of.
The magic in the stories is a system and is not Deus ex machina. It has rules and the stories had to be thought out to follow those rules. I do not like the base rule that a magic user had to be born with the talent. Oh well that’s a personal preference and does not detract from a good story.
Now if you’re strictly a science fiction reader try Mack Reynolds / Dean Ing ‘Home Sweet Home”. Or try Christopher Anvil. Many of his stories explore unintended consequences.
Unintended consequences, that’s when something sounds so good and it’s cheap we do it. Besides how could it go wrong? California, in 1980s went from teaching Phonics (to help reading) in school to mandating the teaching of Natural Language reading. It took them ten years and tying for last place among states in school children reading ability scores before they went back to Phonics. Of course California is a liberal state and teachers teach how they want to not to state mandates, so children are taught with methods that are dubious in their results. We have a generation of people in and from California that can’t read well, but it’s not a worry, we have audio books and cell phones. Who needs to read. Us authors that’s who. I need to publish audio books.
Got a story or author you like. Let me know.
Boring old add;
The serious side of recipes
The news has stories of food shortages. We have had outages, but in the last 100 years we have not had a time where you could get something to eat. We have had soup kitchens and bread lines, but what if there is no food at any price?
Living in earth quake country I have a two week supply of food. My friends have drawn down their stock piles and that may be a bad thing. Now is the time to think about stocking up on food that does not need refrigeration and can be stored for a long time. If everyone does that then we will never need it.
Oatmeal, canned tuna fish, crackers, flour, powered milk, are basics and can be stored for a long time. Water is taken for granted, but if it stops you are in trouble. Rice, beans (canned and raw), that will get used in a year anyway. No one will know you stocked up and you can laugh at yourself a year from now for doing it.
Stay strong, write on.
Professor Hyram Voltage