Thursday, January 19, 2017

The Ballad of Oliver Crump

Martin Hill Ortiz    10:14 AM    No comments
About 10 years ago, I embarked on a kid's book project about a tyrant and bully who announces people's secrets, a commentary on the growing lack of privacy. The character was Oliver Crump and he came to mind just today when I realized his name had the rhyme and cadence of Twitter-mad cyber-bully, Donald...

Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Review of Disturbing the Dark, by Wendy Hornsby

Martin Hill Ortiz    4:21 PM    No comments
Disturbing the Dark is a dangerous book: I almost died of collateral cholesterol. The menu of the Normandy coast countryside is so lushly and deliciously detailed, I had to finish each chapter with a burp. One of this mystery's best features is the immersion in modern rural France with its family ties,...

Monday, January 16, 2017

From Russia With Books

Martin Hill Ortiz    8:46 AM    3 comments
After an iconic image of Michael Caine in The Ipcress File. "I never intended my leading character, James Bond, to be a hero. I intended him to be a sort of blunt instrument wielded by a government department who would get into bizarre and fantastic situations and more or less shoot his way out of...

Monday, January 9, 2017

Looking for Apologies in Trump's Tweets

Martin Hill Ortiz    12:11 PM    No comments
(This is my last planned post about Trump's tweets.) With Donald Trump using so many of his 30,000 plus tweets to insult people, I decided to look into how often he apologized. I searched his Twitter archive for the instances when he used a variant of apology, e.g., apology, apologies, apologize, etc....

Friday, January 6, 2017

The Coming of Age of the Legal Mystery

Martin Hill Ortiz    12:00 PM    No comments
 Having put together an epic Hammett versus Chandler smackdown, I thought I might do the same for Grisham versus Turow. Then I realized that, while I have read nearly all of Hammett and Chandler, I've only sampled a few of the works from the modern masters of the legal thriller – and Grisham...

Thursday, January 5, 2017

Review of Ann Parker's What Gold Buys

Martin Hill Ortiz    4:18 PM    No comments
Like the previous novels in this mystery series, Ann Parker sets What Gold Buys high up in Leadville, Colorado where, in 1880, all of the townsfolk were prospectors of a sort. Some made their wealth from the silver mines while others shook coins loose in gambling parlors and saloons, or in hotels and...

Those Whom Donald Trump Called Racist

Martin Hill Ortiz    7:18 AM    No comments
Someday there may be a source in which all of Donald Trump's speeches and media appearances can be researched. Until then, we have his Twitter archive. Since joining Twitter on May 4, 2009, up through the end of 2016, Donald Trump has posted over 34,000 times [source] or 12.1 tweets per day. Some of...

Wednesday, January 4, 2017

What Do We Mean When We Talk About Race? Final part.

Martin Hill Ortiz    12:55 PM    No comments
How Can I Tell If My Behavior Was Racist? No! It wasn't me! It was the One-Armed Man! (pause, switches voice to that of a gangster) All right, I confess! I did it, ya hear? And I'm glad! Glad, I tell ya! [Jim Carrey cycling through characters as The Mask. The Mask, 1994] One of the great confounders...

Tuesday, January 3, 2017

What Do We Mean When We Talk About Race? Reverse Discrimination

Martin Hill Ortiz    9:52 AM    No comments
In this series of posts, [1], [2], [3], I have been describing racism and its various forms. In the previous post I spoke about reverse racism. I thought it would be best to add an exercise and graphic to illustrate the point. A Depiction of Racist Versus Reverse Racist Sentiments: Racelandia. For...
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