BlogProps x 2: They come, they go

To all the girls I've loved before
Who travelled in and out my door
I'm glad they came along
I dedicate this song
To all the girls I've loved before
To all the girls I once caressed
And may I say I've held the best
For helping me to grow
I owe a lot I know
To all the girls I've loved before

My favorite woman of the right, after carefully sticking a toe or two in to see if she liked the water temperature, has finally taken the dive. Check out Ilana Mercer's Barely a Blog.

Another of my favorite ladies is preparing to take a year off from an exceptionally vigorous Internet-and-phone-driven routine. Don't panic -- Claire Wolfe isn't retiring (she strikes me as constitutionally incapable of embracing the concept!) -- but she is ditching her landline and home Internet connection for a year and will be blogging less. Tune in to WolfesBlog for the last few days before she takes a step back toward the sanity of non-total-interconnectedness ... and then curl up with some of her books.

Which reminds me ... I got a review copy of Rebelfire: Out of the Gray Zone (which Wolfe co-authored with Aaron Zelman of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership) some time ago, and never gave it a full review. Why? Well, I just wasn't seeing anything to say about it that wasn't already being said more smartly ... but I'd hate to have my silence construed as lack of appreciation, and Christmas seems like a good time to give it what little re-boost my endorsement may imply, so here goes:

Rebelfire kicks ass. Its obvious audience is the angst-ridden adolescent rocker crowd, but it's more than good enough to carry its own weight with "adult" audiences. Near-future science fiction in the coming surveillance state, as a young aspiring musician illegally flees his assigned home area to seek stardom (and the book comes with an audio CD including credibly solid renditions of the books theme song, "Justice Day," btw).

Little secret: I hate "juvenile literature." So, I suspect, do most "juveniles." Most of the stuff written for teen audiences is Grade A bullshit. Authors write down to "their" audience -- intentionally or not, it doesn't matter -- and then wonder why kids would rather vegetate in front of the idiot box. The exceptions -- notably Robert Heinlein -- prove the rule. Rebelfire isn't written "down." Yes, it's got an ideological bent to it, but it's a good bent ... and one that's guaranteed to put hooks into the "juvies" who are looking for an answer to the question "why is the world my parents created so screwed up?"

Got kids? Rebelfire will fit nicely into any stocking of reasonable dimensions. Don't got kids? Treat yourself