October 21, 2026 · 5:15 am

Game of the Gods: Walt Simonson’s Wonder Woman run

Walt Simonson’s 1980s run on Thor is one of the comic book greats. His six issue Wonder Woman arc, “Game of the Gods,” isn’t in the same league, but it is entertaining. It comes right between Phil Jimenez and Greg Rucka but I didn’t get around to blogging about it until (obviously) now. Creative credit goes to Simonson for plotting, Jerry Ordway for drawing and Adam T. Hughes for the covers.

We open with a gathering of mystics in the late 1800s who discover signs that the Shattered God is returning to Earth. Then Trevor Barnes, whom she dated during the Jimenez run (he decided being a superhero love interest was more than he could handle) begins worrying when he can’t reach her.

Cut to a funeral that culminates in Diana, in the white pantsuit associated with her depowered years at the end of the Silver Age (though her clothes in that era had a lot more variety), emerging from the grave. The funeral party then turns to monsters and tries to kill her, but fails. At the end of the issue she’s alive but amnesiac, and holding a clay figurine of an infant that the monsters coveted — funny, when she smooths over a cut in the clay arm, a cut on her own arm heals. What’s with that? Simonson said in an interview the inspiration was Hammer’s classic Kiss of the Vampire which opens with an ominous funeral.

The second issue went boldly where no scripter had gone before. Putting Wonder Woman in civvies is one thing, but cutting her hair? Even the depowered years never crossed that line. But you see, Diana soon finds she’s being followed; her shadows are human but possessed, and they wither and die once the possessor leaves them. Fortunately she stumbles into the salon of Becca Doherty, hair stylist and diehard WW fangirl (“You kick butt better than Superman!”). She gives Diana a crash course in who she is even if Diana doesn’t remember it. With Becca’s guidance, Diana successfully turns into Wonder Woman, but devoid of tiara or bracelets, still amnesiac (her attempt to make sense of her superhero life is hilarious). Meanwhile, the Amazons discover that Olympus is empty, the gods gone — hmm, do you suppose there’s a connection? And to strange things happening on Oa, which is situated at the center of the universe?

To prevent the pursuing possessor tracking her, Diana has Becca give her a new look, as you can see on the cover, then sets off to find answers. In the following issue, Diana, the Roman goddess, arrives on Themyscira riding Scylla, the mythological multi-headed sea serpent. Amped up by divine power, it petrifies them. During the War of the Gods crossover event the Roman and Greek pantheons merged but Diana opted to stay free rather than fuse with Artemis. Now she’s on Team Shattered God. Diana arrives on Themyscira, regains her memories and battles Scylla; still only half herself, she does well but ultimately has to flee. Meanwhile, the goddesses of Africa endow Trevor with some mysterious power and direct him to find Diana.

Over the next couple of issues we learn what’s at stake. The Shattered God was a primeval deity; when the God created the universe, it shattered said deity. Who didn’t mind much: the new universe was glorious and he was a part of it all. Except then he realized that countless other gods had sprung up, and he didn’t like it. Now his plan is to reverse creation, restore the primal atom, then start over. His will be the voice that says let there be light, his will be the mind that shapes reality — and he’ll get it right! Diana is a key part of his plan because of her unique makeup: clay and flesh, mortal and divine.

The plan works … almost. That clay image retains the essence of Diana’s god-given powers; without it, she can’t fulfill her role in the Shattered God’s plan. Off to Earth to find the figurine but of course there are surprises waiting and cards the Olympians and other gods have yet to play ….

Simonson’s Thor run is a classic. His Orion is far and away the best Fourth World material not written by Jack Kirby. “Game of the Gods” isn’t in the same league. Like I said, though, it is entertaining, particularly in the early amnesiac period — and amnesia’s enough of a cliche that ain’t easy. It’s less effective as we see more of the divine scheming on both sides of the game; as the final issue points out, some things happened that appear to make no sense (and probably don’t). Still, it’s livelier and more entertaining than the subsequent Greg Rucka run has been so far (I’m in the middle of Year Two).

All rights to images remain with current holders.

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October 20, 2026 · 5:13 am

Covers for a thrilling, mysterious Tuesday

Which is to say, thrillers and mysteries! First, a cover by Roswell Keller.

Next Verne Tossey.

And an uncredited cover to wrap up.

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October 19, 2026 · 5:15 am

First gambling, then AI

An NYT Magazine article looks at how casino wealth and online platforms are spreading gambling everywhere. Although I’d disagree with the author’s idea that techbros are into gambling with their own money: as we’ve seen by their outrage over any attempt to regulate AI, they don’t want to gamble. They want a surety they’ll get richer and richer. And despite Marc Andreessen’s description of himself as an apex predator risking everything, even if they lose they’re at no great risk: a billion out of Andreessen’s pockets would hurt emotionally but it won’t leave him struggling to pay the rent.

As this post points out, gambling is much easier today than when I was a kid. No need to travel to a casino or a betting parlor, you can do it on your phone. And for all the talk about responsible betting, the industry, as Paul Campos at LGM has observed (no direct links) makes its money on people willing to bet big. The guy who lost all his money betting on the ponies used to be a staple of thrillers and mystery fiction, and had its template in real life. This will create more of those losers.

Returning to my point about how the techbros hate risk, they’re all in on using the government to make returns on their investments a sure thing. Great for them, not so good for the rest of the economy as data center-construction is crowding out other investments. The techbros have given the Toddler lots of money and he’s paying them back. In more ways than one. The Toddler is happy to let techbros police themselves and touts his big innovation of calling LLMs “super-intelligence.” Which cannot be hacked … until someone does it.

Microsoft says its big data centers will be good neighbors. It’s not willing to put its money where its mouth is.

It’s alarmingly easy to make AI music, then release it to a real band’s Spotify. Three guesses who gets the money. Or how about this: one Michael Smith streamed thousands of AI songs to music services, then had bots listen to them to generate revenue. He gained $8 million, which he’ll have to pay back due to being convicted and spending 18 months in prison.

Irony: people training AI are getting fired for using AI to do their jobs.

“At 8:15 p.m., Greg Pirio heard the generators start. By dawn, the lung pain he described had pushed him out of his Sterling home and sent him 15 miles down the road to his daughter’s house in Vienna,” due to fumes from the data center.

Wired says “according to interviews with more than two dozen workers, all of whom spoke under the condition of anonymity to avoid jeopardizing their employment, publishers are now using LLMs like Claude and ChatGPT to email literary agents, write publicity and back-cover copy, design cover art, and generate marketing materials, often at the direction of their executives.” One of the quoted employees says it’s infuriating the publishers are going this route instead of paying employees better.

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October 18, 2026 · 5:09 am

A hard life for women (in fact and fiction)

INVISIBLE WOMEN: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Criado Pérez covers similar territory to Defined by Design but it’s a much better book. Even on areas where I have some knowledge — that medical professionals are remarkably clueless and insensitive to women’s pains and health issues — Pérez has fascinating stuff to say. And there’s a lot I didn’t know at all. I will note, though, that she doesn’t deal with cis/trans gender issues and is apparently trans-exclusionary.

Pérez shows in detail how the assumption men — their bodies, their lives — reflect a norm and that we should therefore design the world around them works out badly for women. Transportation planning, for instance, assumes the priority for roads is getting wage-earners to work, not parents taking kids to school; the roads that result are harder to negotiate. Ditto mass transit. Snowplowing roads before sidewalks can lead to more accidents, which usually affect women, who are more likely to be on foot.

For another example, while there are extensive guides on how men should lift heavy weights on construction sites to minimize injury, there’s nothing comparable for women in home-health care, even though they routinely lift hefty human bodies several times a day. Safety equipment designed for the “typical” male body doesn’t fit women, making them unsafe. Voice recognition software often doesn’t recognize women’s voices (one techbro suggested they should take classes on how to adjust their voice).

Lack of data makes things worse: there’s simply no research (at least as of 2019 when this book came out) about how women lifting invalids might hurt or how to do it safely. Even medicine has gotten by for years ignoring women’s different reactions to medicine, disease and drugs. Sometimes that makes doctors blind to adverse effects, sometimes they miss out on treatments that would help women more than men. There’s some evidence Viagra massively reduces menstrual pain but nobody’s interested in funding further studies.

It’s a good but infuriating book. However it also makes me optimistic by showing how small changes can generate big results. A bus ticket that allow women two trips within an hour is beneficial as women often multi-task on trips (first to the doctor, then to their kid’s school, say) and that reduces costs. Sweden discovered that it could encourage men to take paid paternity leave by replacing “this block of leave can go to either parent” with “the husband has up to three months — use it or lose it.” Even with that knowledge, the book is still infuriating.

Like The Exorcist, ROSEMARY’S BABY by Ira Levin spends a lot of time on the mundane lives of our protagonist, Rosemary Woodhouse and her actor husband Guy. Landing a fabulous apartment and wriggling out of their lease. Rosemary decorating and knowing the somewhat obnoxious neighbors. Even after she’s impregnated by Satan, there’s still none of the overt horror we get in The Exorcist. Nevertheless it works where the other book did not. Part of that is that Levin is a slicker, better writer than William Peter Blatty but there’s more to it. I don’t quite have the time but I might reread it and try to figure out why.

There is a horror to the book but it’s very much a woman’s horror, fitting in with the Pérez book above. When Rosemary’s demonic pregnancy starts to hurt her, her doctor (part of the Satanic conspiracy) assures her it’s nothing to worry about, just push through. Her regular doctor writes her off as hysterical when she tells him there’s something monstrous going on. Guy sells out to the Satanists for a better career, helps dope Rosemary, then lets Satan rape her in her sleep. When she wonders about the damage, Guy claims he was horny so he didn’t let her passing out stop him (I was pleasantly surprised that a 1967 novel shows Rosemary completely grossed out by this). It deserves it’s status as a modern horror classic.

All rights to images remain with current holders. Top cover by Rachel Willey.

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October 17, 2026 · 5:06 am

I admit “1950s film blanc movies I often confuse with other movies” is a niche double feature, but hey

I’d never heard of film blanc as a genre before catching THE NIGHT MY NUMBER CAME UP (1955) on DVD but the term goes back to the 1970s. Film noir emphasizes corruption, cynicism (you can clean up some corruption, but not all of it) and bad things happening for no reason — “fate or god or something like that can put the finger on me or you for no reason at all” in the words of Detour. Film blanc has god or supernatural forces putting their finger on the scale to make things better: It’s a Wonderful Life, Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Cabin the Sky, The Bishop’s Wife, etc. Unlike noir, there is a moral order to the blanc universe.

This film shouldn’t work as well as it does. It’s the kind of thing Twilight Zone would have tossed off in 30 minutes: Lindsay (Michael Horden) opens the movie by telling an American officer in the Far East where to find a recently vanished plane. How does he know? He won’t say. Then we flash back to Lindsay at a party, telling his friends about a dream in which the plane they’re taking to Tokyo crashes on the coast. They’re not worried: Lindsay’s dream has eight passengers (they have six), there’s no loudmouth businessman, no problem! Except as the movie progresses, things change and it’s looking more and more similar to the dream …

Yet it does work, very well. It’s tense, absorbing drama, helped by having a solid cast including Michael Redgrave and a young Denholm Elliott. I recommend it highly. In case you’re wondering, the movie that I confuse this with is the David Niven drama A Matter of Life and Death. “Is this your idea of leadership? To lead these people to certain death!”

I tend to think AN INSPECTOR CALLS (1954) is connected to Green for Danger, which also stars Alistair Sim as an inspector; it isn’t, nor is it as good. Based on JB Priestley’s stage play, it’s a “message” drama, and as the phrase goes, they should have sent the message Western Union. Spoilers follow.

We open in 1912 as a rich family — industrialist father, socialite mother, drunken son, spoiled daughter — celebrate the daughter’s marriage to a handsome, wealthy man. Suddenly Inspector Poole stalks into the dining room, at which point I knew he was some kind of phony: no British investigator would do that without being announced. Poole reveals a young woman just committed suicide by drinking bleach and he’s wondering, do any of them know her?

Boy, do they. The father fired Eva (Jane Wenham) for requesting his factory pay higher wages; the daughter got her fired from a salesclerk job because she snickered at an awkward moment; the fiancee had a brief romance with her; the wastrel son had a romance that ended with her pregnant; the mother, sitting on a charity committee decided Eve was a trollop and refused to offer her any aid (the committee wanted her to name the father; for obvious reasons she didn’t think “it’s your son!” would fly). OMG, the entire family is guilty!!! The entire class system is guilty!!!!

But wait, there’s another twist! First a call to the morgue establishes no girl has been brought in as Poole claims — he’s a fraud! Having left the inspector in his windowless study the father goes to confront him — he’s gone! Vanished! And suddenly they get a call from the hospital that now a girl had died in the fashion described … which is a pointless added twist as it doesn’t change anything (if they’d had a chance to save her and refused to act …). A flop, though the play was revived quite successfully in the 1990s. “You and I aren’t the same persons who sat down to dinner.”

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October 16, 2026 · 4:12 pm

My chakras aligned! The power flows to my hand! We have achieved liftoff!

The work week did not start out well.

Sunday, we went out for a relatively late dinner. It’s been forever since my acid reflux was a problem but eating a large meal late, plus a chocolate dessert, plus a glass of wine made it kick in. It was still kicking in as I went to bed so zero sleep. Monday night was almost as bad — I fell into the “I have to sleep, I have to sleep!” state of mind and as y’all may know, that guarantees someone won’t sleep well.

(From a trip to our auto dealer for an oil change recently. I’ve no idea why geese consider the parking lot such a happening place).

Tuesday night I expected more of the same, particularly given I’d be getting to bed late due to a writer’s group meeting. But nope — it wasn’t quite enough but it was a normal, solid night of sleep. Waking up in the morning felt so good, hence the title of this post. It helped that for the first time in a while, I drew up a tighter schedule for my day’s activities. With the dogs and their increasing health needs, staying on schedule has become increasingly difficult so I started writing down tasks for the day and not worrying about the hour by hour structure. It turns out even if I don’t follow it exactly, hour by hour works better for me. Lesson learned!

That kept me going the rest of the week but my insomnia Monday and Tuesday meant the productive days were undercut by the dazed ones. And it’s not like I caught up on sleep the rest of the week. And the acid reflux lingered, which is unpleasant, plus I had a sore shoulder. Happily, they’ve cleared up — at my age I always worry they’re the first sign of permanent loss of function.

All that said, here’s my week in writing:

I sold four ebook copies of Southern Discomfort on Amazon. I know, it puts money in Bezos’ pocket, but next to hand-selling at cons, it’s still my largest sales channel. Also one copy of Questionable Minds. Thanks, whoever you are who bought them!

I got the PDF of Watching Jekyll and Hyde for me to proof and index. The schedule’s tight but doable.

So is the schedule for using my Draft2Digital and Amazon accounts to get Become the Sky ready for release mid-November. Both together, though? It will be tough. I’m currently making a last pass over the manuscript to spot any last typos and yes, I found some. Once that’s done, hopefully it will be smooth sailing, though I’ve often had to adjust the formatting to make it come out right on D2D. Fingers crossed, not too much difficulty.

Oh, and I still have Local Reporter articles to do for November. Plus I need to take a couple of days off soon for personal stuff. Overall, accomplishing the Big Three is doable, but not easily doable. But hey, if the job was gonna be easy, they wouldn’t have sent me to do it!

The dogs have demanded some attention too. Trixie used to just gulp her pills down in a little ball of soft food; now she needs them ground up, spread on a plate of soft food, with enough stuff added (chicken, pumpkin, treats or similar enhancers) that she’ll eat it … slowly. This expands the morning and evening dosing time. Plus she’s still having to go out more frequently because of her incontinence issues. It’s distracting but she’s my little girl, and I will adjust. It did get a lot easier after my mid-week reboot. Perhaps that will keep up.

To compensate for the stress of the added demands, I made a chocolate cake.

It helped a lot. Though it’s not so good for the reflux.

Over at Atomic Junk Shop I got in posts about the unsuccessful TV series Time Express and the way the Bronze Age revived unsuccessful superheroes along with supervillains.

Wish me luck. If I can get everything done by deadline next month, I am so going to celebrate, though I’m not yet sure how.

Southern Discomfort cover by Sam Collins, Become the Sky by Sonya Lano. All rights to images remain with current holders.

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October 16, 2026 · 5:10 am

I am the very goodest dog, daddy

This is what Plushie looks like when one of us is cooking.

It doesn’t matter what we’re cooking or whether it’s even edible, he sits there with his Goodest Dog face on, waiting for us to share the nummy nummy treats.

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October 15, 2026 · 5:31 am

The Toddler openly sides with Putin against the Ukraine

“President Trump called on Ukraine to replace Volodymyr Zelensky as its leader and piled pressure on Kyiv to stop airstrikes against Russian oil refineries, a day after the U.S. leader announced a deal to boost Moscow’s diesel exports. 

“I think it’s time for Ukraine to get a new president,” Trump told reporters on Saturday, blaming Zelensky for Russia’s continuing war on the country—and Kyiv’s airstrikes for high diesel prices in the U.S. and worldwide. “He better damn well stop,” Trump said.”

No surprise. The Toddler’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, recently tried brokering peace — diplomacy for which he has no qualifications other than being the Toddler’s family — and said Ukraine ruined the deal by not agreeing to give up land to Russia. Imagine that, the Ukraine doesn’t want to give Russia what Russia can’t obtain by force. Needless to say, any promises Russia makes in return won’t be worth the paper they’re written on. However ending the war would allegedly benefit some of Kushner’s cronies, much like his envoy work in the Middle East. Given Kushner recommended not aggressively testing for covid during the pandemic because it would hit blue states worse, it wouldn’t be surprising if he considered dollars for him, defeat for Ukraine a fair deal.

And I’m sure from the White House’s perspective (and probably Republicans), having Putin recreate the old Soviet sphere of control as he wants to do would work out great. The Toddler’s National Security Strategy lists Western Europe as our greatest security threat — too many nonwhite immigrants, too much democracy, not enough power in far-right hands. White supremacists and fascists would be so much easier to deal with. Putin in charge would be, too.

I imagine Putin sees European democracy in the same light. Recent right-wing success in East Germany and a strong showing for the French far right may not be a natural outgrowth of those countries’ politics (though they might be, I admit) — after all, Elon Musk works to promote the far right in Europe. The Toddler administration unashamedly pushed for Viktor Orban to stay in power in Hungary and punished Brazil after convicting former president Bolsonaro for attempting a coup.

Game recognizes game. The Toddler undoubtedly understands someone like Putin or Bolsonaro better than he ever will Barack Obama or Hilary Clinton. Plus there are advantages in dealing with people who have no legal restraints on their actions: if Putin wants to throw a billion the Toddler’s way, who’s going to stop him? And these right-wing movements are all misogynist and white supremacist, which makes them compatible with the American right wing. It’s a win, except for Ukrainians and decent Americans. And American soldiers: Putin supports Iran which has injured hundreds of our military yet the Toddler’s still in Putin’s corner.

Lawyers, Guns and Money says the Toddler still has enough levers to pull that pressuring Ukraine might work out well for Russia, bad for Ukraine. I hope it’s not so. Certainly he’s getting frustrated, snarling to a reporter that of course there’s a ceasefire — he told them “you agree” so that’s that. Yeah, right.

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October 14, 2026 · 5:13 am

Sherlock Holmes: “Any truth is better than indefinite doubt”

I used this quote from the Holmes story “The Yellow Face” about seven years ago. I’m finding it useful as I outline the next draft of Let No Man Put Asunder. Holmes makes the observation to reassure his client that getting answers about his wife’s strange behavior will be preferable to wondering and not knowing.

As in the earlier post, I think it applies slightly differently to writing: sitting and thinking and debating about how to rewrite the book is “indefinite doubt.” Making a decision and putting it down in the outline is “truth.” It’s a truth that may not hold up; when I review the outline or when I sit down and write the story out, what I outlined may not work. Nevertheless, it’s more productive than worrying whether moving a couple of big reveals up to halfway through the book will work or maybe I should leave it as they are. If I don’t put something down on paper, the next draft will never get written. Neither will the book.

The outline changes a lot of things from Draft #2. Perhaps most significantly, I trim my overcrowded cast. Mostly by having some of the supporting cast only appear for a couple of chapters, then fade away. Maybe it’ll feel odd to have them wander in and wander out and I’ll have to revise back or come up with something new. I can’t revise the manuscript until it exists so this is an improvement. I’ve also eliminated an encounter with my vampire mastermind and made her front person, Yuki do all the adversary work. The way the book is shaping up, Yuki will make a more interesting foe.

Another improvement (I hope) is moving those reveals. Placed early enough in the story, a partial reveal should make readers curious about what they’ve learned — what does it mean, how does it affect Paul and Mandy? That’ll accomplish more than holding them in reserve until the end. And ultimately, as with Southern Discomfort, my lead characters and the change in their lives will hopefully matter more and be more compelling.

If not, more revisions ahead. I can live with that. But if I’ve made serious progress on the problems in D2, maybe there will be fewer of them.

“Yellow Face” image by Sidney Paget, Southern Discomfort cover by Sam Collins, rights to it are mine.

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October 13, 2026 · 5:15 am

Our trip to the Farmers’ Market

For our date a few weeks back, TYG and I hit one of the local farmers’ markets. This one’s in downtown Durham which gave me a chance to snap some nice photos of the skyline.

And some building art.

There’s some art and clothing stores around the market area so I took a couple of shots there too.

There was also lots of food: chocolate treats, potatoes, tomatoes, heritage flours etc. Some we ate on the spot. Some we brought home. I didn’t think to photograph any but even if I had, I’m not sure an organic, locally grown potato looks that different from a regular potato from Sprouts.

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