Dec 14
Click for larger imageGary Comments: (softly weeping): My country ’tis of thee…
Published 2004
(Average: 1.44 out of 10)
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Gary Comments: (softly weeping): My country ’tis of thee…
Published 2004
(Average: 1.44 out of 10)Loading...
(9.25 out of 10) (9.18 out of 10) (9.01 out of 10) (8.97 out of 10) (8.93 out of 10) (8.93 out of 10) (8.93 out of 10) (8.92 out of 10) (8.88 out of 10) (8.88 out of 10)
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December 14th, 2021 at 1:56 pm
They got their Fourth of July celebrations started a century before Washington was born. And they still got it wrong.
December 14th, 2021 at 2:35 pm
“Give me a U! Give me an N! Give me a D! Give me an E! Give me – oh, sod this, it’s “Underage”, basically.”
December 14th, 2021 at 3:32 pm
‘The Grantville Gazette was listed on the Locus (magazine) Paperback Bestsellers List for two months in a row during 2005, topping at number 9.’
Wikipedia
Jail bait and switch.
December 14th, 2021 at 3:59 pm
Edited by Eric “Larry” Flynt
December 14th, 2021 at 5:08 pm
@Biblio Good show, sir.
December 14th, 2021 at 7:15 pm
Ebarasssed, dearie? That’s OK, we’re embarrassed too.
Is this supposed to represent American values or something?
(I may be missing the forest for the undergrowth here, but is that meant to be a cheerleader’s pom-pom to go with the baton? It looks like a clump of grass.)
Ditto on @Biblio.
December 14th, 2021 at 8:06 pm
This cover is so utterly bizarre that I’m going to write to an actual psychiatrist who might be able to explain it.
I mean, what the hell, Baen? Was this a flat-out attempt to court creepazoids?
December 14th, 2021 at 10:42 pm
So it’s basically fan fiction?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grantville_Gazette
December 14th, 2021 at 10:55 pm
@A.R. Yngve: maybe it’s meant to own the libs?
@Micheal Toland: increasingly, the whole series is a huge fan-pander, with most of the books by Flint co-authored with fans of the series possessed of some ability to provide useful input: most notably Virginia De Marce, who has professional chops as a historian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_DeMarce
December 14th, 2021 at 11:59 pm
Literally wrapping herself in the flag. Poor girl (and I do mean “girl”) is probably cold and chagrined. That pompom and baton aren’t going to cover much.
I am boggled at the obvious expression of embarrassment on her face. Not come-hither, not sexy, just a fixed smile. Evidently the viewer is supposed to be further turned on by her humiliation. She clearly looks like she doesn’t want to be there being perved on. She just wants to be a cheerleader and baton twirler! Someone call Child Services to rescue her!
It puts the flag on its skin or it gets the hose again…
This is incredibly skeevy, even for them.
@B’man: GSS!
@Bruce: It’s the values of the part of the US that reads BAEN!gunsandboobsMerica?
There are certain elements that don’t think Roy Moore or Matt Gaetz did anything wrong, nor disapproved of Cheeto Benito wandering through dressing rooms of teenage girls and regularly hanging out with Epstein.
To coin a phrase, it’s deplorable.
December 15th, 2021 at 7:43 am
So fan fiction begot a new subgenre of published books – you might name it “Bespoke SF…”
I predict that in the near future “Bespoke SF” will be the majority output. (See Hari Seldon discuss empire building with Paul Atreides – because the fans demanded it!)
December 15th, 2021 at 8:07 am
“Gee, this new laser depilatory stick works wonders! No more armpit hair!!”
December 15th, 2021 at 4:04 pm
Okay, so this is an actual painting done in-story by one of the Dutch Masters alive at the time. There is a kerfluffle as some of the more repressed uptimers (from 1999 West Virginia) react much like commenters above, while the downtimers (natives of the 1630s) don’t see what the problem is. It’s art. (IIRC, that painting is of Julie Sims, former cheerleader and most feared marksman in Europe. If it were downtimer Gretchen Richter, she’d have insisted on one or both tits out because she is all about the French Revolution motifs.)
December 15th, 2021 at 4:57 pm
Actually, it would be perfect as a sample of WWII bomber art if the series was titled ‘1942’.
December 15th, 2021 at 9:38 pm
@Dave Van Domelen: ah, the “the imaginary people I made up are fine with it, so you’re a prude/hypocrite/dummy for thinking it’s wrong” excuse. I recall the series also had “17th century women are fine with being raped, as long as the rapist marries them” as something else to rub the noses of modern feminists in.
Also, the painting isn’t being shown to (imaginary) 17th century audiences, but to actual 21st century readers, some of which might like to read on the bus without making other people uncomfortable. (Of course, to some Baen readers, the cover of the book they’re reading being triggery to libs is a feature, not a bug.)
December 16th, 2021 at 12:50 am
(Pardon my ranting. The tendency of SF/fantasy writers to create often contrived scenarios and then acting as if they make some sort of serious real-world point or moral lesson is one of my pet peeves, and I need to let it go walkies occasionally.)
Anyhoo, waaay too much seriousness here. Let’s get back to making fun of silly cover illustrations without brooding on the context.
December 16th, 2021 at 12:58 am
Rant away, Bruce, this is one of the skeeviest covers we’ve had on the site.
December 16th, 2021 at 1:14 am
I fully co-sign Bruce’s rant. Every word of it.
Being a woman, I am even more viscerally insulted and incensed by this.
If I saw someone reading this on the bus, I would move away quickly, because who knows what else they would be into? I’ve sat next to actual no-fooling gang members (in their colors) and felt safe.
(The last gangsta I sat next to was quite polite. Called me “ma’am”.)
December 16th, 2021 at 2:44 pm
A book-cover has a job to do, so suggesting that a failure to do it is justified because it’s art – and trying to pull rank on ‘philistines’ and ‘prudes’ who comment on the failure – might work better if the other books in this series had Francis Bacon, Robert Mapplethorpe or early Damien Hurst on them. Either way, other people on the bus might think less of you but you have the moral glow of superiority to sustain you as they edge away and mutter about you behind your back. Win-win.
December 16th, 2021 at 2:46 pm
But what I came here to say was: I can’t read that title without imagining Ronnie Barker stammering it.
December 17th, 2021 at 3:34 am
@Tat: Nowadays if I saw a guy reading this on the bus, I wouldn’t be thinking “ooh, it’s an artistic parody”, I’d be thinking “I hope he’s not an incel who’s going to suddenly shoot up the whole bus.”
I’d also hope he wouldn’t feel the need to mansplain about how we’re all prudes because he and the imaginary people are fine with it.
December 17th, 2021 at 7:45 pm
The cover doesn’t look creepy because of nudity; it looks creepy because it is creepy.
December 17th, 2021 at 11:50 pm
@ARY: Exactly. She’s not showing any more skin than you’d see if she was wearing a bikini, although we’re probably supposed to presume she’s not wearing anything under Old Glory.
It’s the overall skeeviness.
Also, Real Americans would not disrespect the flag by using it to drape over a nude woman! That’s against the US Flag Code!
Title 4, chapter 1, part 8(d)
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/4/8
Right there in the codification of Federal statutes, which exist to be the implementation of the Constitution.
I’m pretty sure using the flag for creepy purposes is frowned on.
(Had to look up the statute; used to know it when I was a Girl Scout.)
Strict Constitutionalists would frown on this. Republicans were very fond of citing this against “all those damn hippies” wearing flags or parts thereof back in the day.
December 18th, 2021 at 12:01 am
“Republicans were very fond of citing this against “all those damn hippies” wearing flags or parts thereof back in the day.”
@GSS ex-noob: “if _we_ do it, it’s OK, since we’re the good guys.” Also, is there anything a jingoist loves more than wrapping themselves in the flag?
December 19th, 2021 at 5:18 am
@Bruce: Wrapping himself in the flag would have been preferable to what Cheeto Benito did to it that one time. Euchhh.