Joe E. Katt (aka Joey) has developed a taste for 'the good stuff'. He has made the not unreasonable claim that since I stand to gain from the inclusion of a cat in my new novel,
Pelgraff
, he (a cat) should have some part in that gain. Hence his promotion to a better grade of food.
My argument--I've yet to receive any royalties from any of my works--has brought no relief. The cat remains adamant. He claims his argument--Feed me the good stuff or get no sleep--trumps mine. There may soon be war in the Boulter household, and I'm sure we all can predict the winner (hint: it ain't gonna be the human).
Now, war is an ugly thing and, after the Sol-System War wiped out all life on Earth and in the Sol-system entire, Earth's ex-colony worlds eschewed it. 450 years of peace followed that devastation and war slipped from the human lexicon.
PELGRAFF: On a planet peacefully and harmoniously populated by both humans and the gorilla-like Pagayans, civil war has broken out, fostered by a third species, the Damargs. None of Earth's ex-colony worlds want to hear about it, much less get involved. But one member of the space-based Trading League, Colleen Yrden, is raising an Interplanetary Brigade to fight on Pelgraff.
Alan McLean left the New Brittain police service under a cloud: he killed a man under questionable circumstances. His need to belong to something, anything, drives him to accept Colleen's offer of employment--to help train the Interplanetary Brigade--despite his natural disgust at the endeavour and his dislike for the Pagayans. It doesn't hurt that she believes in him where all others have turned their backs.
Though he signs on to train men in weapons and tactics only, he finds himself drawn into the conflict and his growing hatred of the brutal Damargs--as well as his unrequited feelings for Colleen--holds him on Pelgraff even as politics makes the prospect of eventual victory increasingly unlikely and his bigotry towards Pagayans makes equally unlikely a relationship with Colleen. Others may leave, but McLean is determined to stay to the end, however it turns out.
Please check out Pelgraff and, if the sample pleases, you may help feed my cat and prevent another war.
Foreward from
Pelgraff:
They have said many things of us, some true.
We have been called criminals and outlaws. Others called us: brutal, vicious killers who cared for nothing; a disgrace to our race; an insult to the memory of those who forged a new society after The Great Die-Off. And they have said that we single-handedly returned humanity to the barbarism of the past.
Perhaps they had the right of it in some aspects, but we were much, much more.
With war now touching more populated systems, Pelgraff largely lies forgotten. But not by us who fought there, who saw our friends die there, victims of the enemy and of those who should have been friends. No, we have not forgotten. We shall never forget.
And we shall never forget the honours we received for buying desperately needed time with our youth, with our bodies, with our very lives. Yes, the honours: scorn, vilification and banishment.
We have been reviled and then worse, forgotten, put from their narrow minds. All they want from us, now, is silence. They do not wish to be reminded that events proved us right and them wrong. Perhaps that was our greatest sin—to be proven correct.
But I will not fade away. Not yet. Not until they are forced to give us our due. Not until our side of the story is told. Then I will slip into the anonymity that I crave. For I, too, have needs. I need to do the impossible: to let it go. Sometimes I think I have lived too long.
But if the call were to come . . .
I have often been asked, had I the chance to do it again, if I would. I have never answered that question and have ignored those who asked. But I answer it now. In a heartbeat. For
her. I pay my debts. If
she were to call I, and all the others, would answer that call. But she will not call; for she knows we have given enough.
Alan (Mad Dog) McLean
ADO 458
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