follow up on Unintended Consequences??

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^ "Editing" does not imply impressing one's own moral standards on a work.
 
FWIW, I downloaded the book and am about through it. Absolutely great job putting a lot of history into a docudrama format. Only unfortunate thing is that it brought back some darn unpleasant memories as I have lived through most of what is covered since 1944 and have never had much faith in the FBI, ATF, or other "government" agencies. Had a chance at joining the FBI just after Kent State, spent time with a recruiting agent and was so turned off by the Hoover suckup mentality and holier than thou attitude that I just kept on teaching, shooting and hunting. Had a good friend that was an ATF(no E then) and he was a great guy...former Green Beret, IBI, and finally ATF agent. One of the few. When dad died I wanted to continue the gun shop but he advised me to have an accident with the faulty records and start anew later. Good advice.
I'll start looking for a hard copy of the book (or several to give away) for my library.
It will go right along with stuff by Keith, Skelton, Sharpe, Greener, Nonte, and my good second amendment stuff from the NRA and ISRA.
Great job John. Enjoyed seeing him on G&A show a few years back.
 
As once described by another Author here at THR, UC suffers from "first book-it is..." ;)
It is probably longer than it needed to be but then so were Atlas Shrugged and some of Tom Clancy's books .
 
UC could have been vastly improved with a thorough edit from a strictly grammatical/literary standpoint without changing the story one iota.
r u oneah them thar English Majors :p
 
I liked it, it had great history on pre-1968 US firearm culture too.

Bought it in hardcover, lost that, found a pirate .PDF copy online.

With the age onset progression of my presbyopia, I derive far less enjoyment from printed books. With electronic books, I can enlarge the print for comfortable reading.
Printed books also take up far more space than electronic ones too :)
I've worked in libraries in the past so any enjoyment derived from handling books was satiated long ago.

I find that 2nd amendment fiction is difficult to access via interlibrary loan. This is no doubt because it's a niche market and acquisitions by librarians of such is probably rare.

The only real way that is likely to change is for members of the gun culture to contribute titles to the libraries.
 
Here's part of what an editor does (Quote from Aragon):

The kinky sex didn't offend me but it was pretty clear that the author was projecting some of his own fantasies (realities?) which gave a very slimy to the overall work.

Edited:

The kinky sex didn't offend me but it was pretty clear that the author was projecting some of his own fantasies (realities?) which gave a very slimy feel to the overall work.

Couldn't resist. :D

No 'ffense.

As I said, every good writer needs a good editor.

Terry, 230RN
 
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He took some artistic license with the history, hardly setting a precedent. :rolleyes:
It's probably worth some back checking, if your interested in the historic aspects.
 
One thing that many UC groupies don't seem to realize is that if UC was a more polished and less kinky work, it may well have sold thousands of times more copies.

Rather than be a tiny cult hit it may have been a NYT bestseller -- and it may just have given millions of people pause in their condemnation of guns and the so-called "gun culture."
 
One thing that many UC groupies don't seem to realize is that if UC was a more polished and less kinky work, it may well have sold thousands of times more copies.
like Fifty Shades of Grey :confused:
shoulda...................coulda...................woulda
meh
Maybe he'd contract you to edit the P out of the PG and make it PC.
 
Aragon said,

One thing that many UC groupies don't seem to realize is that if UC was a more polished and less kinky work, it may well have sold thousands of times more copies.

Rather than be a tiny cult hit it may have been a NYT bestseller -- and it may just have given millions of people pause in their condemnation of guns and the so-called "gun culture."

I agreed with that already, though more on a suggestion basis:

I'd like to see if it could use a good editing. After all, if it can be made more readable, as some suggest, it might find a wider audience... which would be a good thing, I guess. At least according to what I've read herein.


Terry, 230RN
 
like Fifty Shades of Grey
shoulda...................coulda...................woulda

Maybe he'd contract you to edit the P out of the PG and make it PC.

No, I wouldn't be qualified to edit a work like that. There are professionals out there that do it for a living...

Aside from the grammatical/literary editing, it's not a matter of being "PC." It's about getting rid of slimy excess that in no way adds to the story line. Maybe the author felt the need to portray Henry as a weirdo but it wasn't necessary to the story.
 
Scratches multiple itches

Reloading, ballistics, calibers, NFA, flying, motorcycles, second amendment, government overreach, FREEDOM.

I like S&W 29's. And 20 MM HE (from a former Vulcan gunner).

Holy crap.
 
You made me go and look. Mine is a 5th eddition, signed in 2004.

I took Ross' MO CCW class around then, but had bought the book a couple of years before. He had some interesting perspective, as he was one of the people involved in getting Missouri's CCW law passed.

It was also by far the "best value" of the 3 or 4 CCW classes I've taken. I want to say he charged around $100. He'd teach the classroom portion in the evening, and maybe once a month have several of those evening groups meet at his gravel pit, just across the river in Illinois.

For his $100 fee, he would provide guns, ammo, lunch (grilled burgers & hot dogs). And it was a pretty good selection, including several common semi autos and revolvers. I recall shooting a couple of S&W .500s (not bad to shoot) and a scandium framed S&W .44 Mag with hardwood grips (very unpleasant).

Once everyone had shot and eaten, he pulled out the machine guns. It was $20 for 3 mags of your choice. He gave a free Thompson mag to anyone who wanted to buy his book. (I already had it, so he signed it and gave me a mag to shoot anyway). I then put a couple of mags through his FN-D, and one through his Glock 18.

So now I tell people I used a full-auto Glock to pass my MO CCW class. Makes for a good story. :D
 
You made me go and look. Mine is a 5th eddition, signed in 2004.

I took Ross' MO CCW class around then, but had bought the book a couple of years before. He had some interesting perspective, as he was one of the people involved in getting Missouri's CCW law passed.

It was also by far the "best value" of the 3 or 4 CCW classes I've taken. I want to say he charged around $100. He'd teach the classroom portion in the evening, and maybe once a month have several of those evening groups meet at his gravel pit, just across the river in Illinois.

For his $100 fee, he would provide guns, ammo, lunch (grilled burgers & hot dogs). And it was a pretty good selection, including several common semi autos and revolvers. I recall shooting a couple of S&W .500s (not bad to shoot) and a scandium framed S&W .44 Mag with hardwood grips (very unpleasant).

Once everyone had shot and eaten, he pulled out the machine guns. It was $20 for 3 mags of your choice. He gave a free Thompson mag to anyone who wanted to buy his book. (I already had it, so he signed it and gave me a mag to shoot anyway). I then put a couple of mags through his FN-D, and one through his Glock 18.

So now I tell people I used a full-auto Glock to pass my MO CCW class. Makes for a good story. :D

What was his gravel pit like? A good place to shoot? That's really a great deal for a hundred bucks...
 
I had a first printing but it was destroyed by a friend's dog when I loaned it to him. My current copy is a 3rd or 4th printing probably. Local library has a couple copies in the system too.

Does anyone recall the character name that got changed after the first printing, something to do with libel or some such?
 
Just finished reading it at the online source linked earlier and enjoyed it very much. Gave up far too much of this past weekend reading it, but I just couldn't wait to find what happened next. The historical aspects especially provide much food for thought.
 
Does anyone recall the character name that got changed after the first printing, something to do with libel or some such?
Clayton Nelson, from Gunnison, CO - changed to Bischoff from VT. There's now just a passing reference to Nelson as, "but that's not as bad as that guy in Colorado. He even makes 2-bores, but I hear that he quit that."

Nelson was upset that his character was portrayed as saying, "By God I
hope every damned one of them bastards gets killed, and it looks like we're a good ways there."
 
rodregier
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Join Date: August 5, 2007
Location: Halifax,NS Canada
Posts: 1,536

I liked it, it had great history on pre-1968 US firearm culture too.

Bought it in hardcover, lost that, found a pirate .PDF copy online.

I came across a copy online, here, at this site I believe. It was shorter, fewer pages than my hard cover copy, 5th printing, 861 pages, and having browsed through it a little, I noticed some text differences between it and the printed book. I reread mine now and then, still finding it interesting. Supposedly, there was supposed to be a sequel, doesn't seem to have happen, more's the pity, as same might have been quite interesting.
 
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