Internal Chronology and Status of the Kevin Traynor Stories as of April 2021

Gunpowder Tea (Young Kevin Traynor) (fragment, may be abandoned)

Traynor and his future best friend Nick Parker meet during an adventure in Casablanca.

Torch in the Night (available)

Traynor, Parker, and Jennifer Jordan have to stop a conspiracy to destroy the United States.

Phantom Train (available)

Traynor, Parker, and mining engineer Connie Chandler investigate a phantom train depopulating an Arizona mining town.

Mysterious Boat (available):

The Mystery of the Mysterious Boat

Traynor, Jennifer, and Parker investigate a mysterious boat haunting an old house in Malibu.

The Secret of the Lost Tribe

Traynor and Jennifer encounter Indian ghost riders in New Mexico.

Mystic Triangle (writing)

Traynor, Jennifer, and Parker get involved in an Anarcho-Capitalist revolution.

Kevin Traynor, P.I. (working title):

The Phantom of Broadway (fragment, abandoned due to boring)

Traynor's Broadway theater is haunted by a phantom.

The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors (available)

Jennifer's Frank O'Connor paintings are stolen from a locked room.

Eighty Million Maniacs (rewriting, editing)

Howard is kidnapped to force Traynor and Jennifer to find a hidden treasure in a medieval town in the land of eighty million maniacs.

Chelsea Cinderella (editing)

During a party, the crown jewels of Nassau-Wittgenstein are stolen from that country's embassy in New York City.

The Riddle of the Ratty Rock Star (fragment, may be postponed to a later book or abandoned)

An unsavory punk rocker is killed in a locked room.

Kevin Traynor and Crypto Queenie (working title):

Time Slip (writing)

Traynor and crypto currency wizard Britt Coyne travel back to the Middle Ages in a castle in Latvia.

Voynich Manuscript (writing)

Traynor, Britt, and Parker follow the clues encoded in the Voynich manuscript to find its treasure in Prague.

La Serenissima (idea, plotting)

Traynor and Britt fly to Venice, Italy, for a romantic getaway; hilarity ensues.

Little Red Riding Hood

Once upon a time, Little Red Riding Hood went visiting her grandmother. So Little Red Riding Hood put on her little red riding hood and set out on a dangerous hike on the winding paths under the gloomy canopy of trees, where the wilding wolves had taken many a jogger. Finally, after a perilous journey past the tree huggers, hippies, bums, junkies, and perverts of the forest, she emerged on Central Park West.

When she got to the tiny cottage at the end of the limestone canyon where her grandmother lived, she knocked at the door. "Granny, Granny, are you home? I brought you your favorite rugelach!"

But when the door creaked open, it wasn't her grandmother opening it, but a handsome, charming prince with a head of luxuriant blond hair, much like a golden pussycat.

"Why, what orange skin you have!" exclaimed Little Red Riding Hood in wonder.

"The better to stain you with!" the prince growled.

"What tiny, deep-set eyes, framed by pale circles, like a negative image of the raccoons in the woods, or a highwayman's mask, you have!"

"The better to ogle you with!"

"What short, vulgar fingers you have!"

"The better to grope you with!"

"What shiny big hair you have!"

"The better to seduce you with!"

"Uh, is my Granny home, sir?" Little Red Riding Hood timidly changed the subject.

"No, she very, very, very much isn't! And you'll really, really never see her again, you little red anchor baby! I deported your huge illegal alien grandmother to her ancestral homeland! Sad. Will you marry me, you huge little hater and loser?" the prince boldly changed the subject. "It's going to be amazing. Believe me."

"But why would I marry you, you who deported my Granny?" Little Red Riding Hood sobbed.

"Because you're a really, really hot piece of ass under that very, very, very silly little red riding hood, plus I really, really like marrying aliens. Because I'm the God Emperor Donald J. Trump, and I'm very, very, very rich. I'll give you $10,000,000! Because I'll make you great again, like everything I touch! Because I have huge, well-formed hands! Look, having God Emperor Donald J. Trump — my uncle was a great professor and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton School of Finance, very good, very smart — you know, if you’re a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if, like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I'm one of the smartest people anywhere in the world — it’s true! — but when you're a conservative Republican, they try — oh, do they do a number — that’s why I always start off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there, went there, did this, built a fortune — you know I have to give my, like, credentials all the time, because we’re a little disadvantaged — but you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers me — it would have been so easy, and it’s not as important as these lives are (nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power, and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what's going to happen, and he was right — who would have thought?), but when you look at what's going on with the four prisoners — now it used to be three, now it’s four — but when it was three and even now, I would have said it's all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don't, they haven’t figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it’s gonna take them about another 150 years — but the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us. Oh, and otherwise, I'll have to deport you to your ancestral homeland. You'd really, really be a not smart person. Believe me. Sad."

By now, Little Red Riding Hood was deeply in love with the God Emperor Donald J. Trump, with his unwarranted self-confidence, his money, his power, his fame, his charm, his wit, his intellect, his handsome good looks, and his beautiful hair, like all women. Plus, he had freed her from her really, really not good, nasty, horrible, fat, old illegal alien grandmother with the face of a dog (who used to bleed from every possible orifice in her younger days).

And they lived happily ever after, if he didn't leave her for a younger woman. Sad.

A Fairytale of New York 

Happy Birthday, America!

Happy Birthday, America! Here's the present:

The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors, free to download for your Kindle today, July 4, 2013, midnight to midnight Pacific Time. The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors, the new Kevin Traynor mystery. A locked room mystery about art, anarchy, objectivity, and madness.

When his girlfriend's prized paintings are stolen from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Kevin Traynor has to find them fast, lest she slip from her usual objectivity and rationality into madness, mayhem, and murder. There is no lack of suspects — and no way how any human being can have smuggled the paintings out of that proverbial locked room. There simply is no explanation that is both rational and plausible. The hunt for the thief leads the couple into one dead end after another. It dawns on Traynor that the only way to find the thief is to find the paintings... But is he up against a mere mortal thief, or against The Phantom of the Met?

Kevin Traynor. With the right to be politically incorrect.

The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors, Chapter One, Part Two

Begin with the beginning.

To save himself from exploding with laughter and from his girlfriend's ensuing ire, Traynor sauntered over to the column wall, where his best friend, Nick Parker, stood staring at Diminishing Returns, going, "For some reason, I like that mannequin…"

Short but muscular, with dark eyes and wavy black hair, Parker looked like a bull ready to charge a red rag. Apparently, he was giving the redhead he had been flirting with some time to miss him before he reeled her in. Traynor followed his friend's stare. The painting featured a painter's wooden mannequin sitting on a turquoise drum in turn sitting on a reddish cliff. Below, a blue ocean, or at least a reservoir, like Lake Powell on the Colorado River, stretched beyond a reddish headland. Above, a cloud in several shades of blue with a silver lining covered most of a blue sky. The mannequin was juggling what looked like colorful Christmas balls, with a red one already shattered on the ground.

To Traynor, it looked like surrealism, and not very good surrealism at that. The most he could make of it was a caricature of Howard Roark gone crazy on his cliff. According to Jennifer, the official Objectivist line was that the playful lay figure represented gaiety. If it made her happy…

As far as Traynor was concerned, the exact opposite might be just as true. The inescapably surreal nature of the painting might symbolize statism. The wooden, faceless, soulless stick figure might be a government bureaucrat playing with and casually breaking the baubles produced by capitalism.

Others said that the mannequin, having hooters, the drummer on her turquoise drum, was Ayn Rand, and that the balls she was juggling bore self-portraits of her husband Frank O'Connor. You take it from there. To Traynor, any interpretation was as good as any other in this case, as any the other flavor of intellectuals offered for the nonobjective art in the other galleries.

Parker stirred. "Gotta go now, look after another lay figure."

Traynor looked languidly on as his friend left the gallery. As languidly, the muddy river of the mayor's speech emptied into an ocean of applause. Now the crowd grew restless, some milling to the paintings, some out of the gallery to one of the impromptu bars. Traynor headed back to his girlfriend.

Whoosh!

Suddenly, clouds of smoke billowed from the air conditioning vents. The fire alarm sounded.

"Fire!" Panicky cries rang out, interspersed with coughs.

People rushed to the exits, but that moment something or somebody triggered the burglar alarm, and the massive steel doors clanked shut, locking everybody in. Traynor ducked under the thickening smoke screen. Where was Jennifer?

He dashed toward the place he had seen her last, rooted through a forest of legs, homed in on a fair pair under a black miniskirt, ran into her, and grabbed her by the wrist. "Gotcha!"

"You play with Nick for five seconds, and bang, there's a fire."

"I try to do my best. But I'm not sure that there's fire where there's smoke."

However, the gallery kept filling with dark-gray smoke. Some people tried to filter the smoke by breathing through tissues or handkerchiefs. It did not seem to help much. Others dropped to the floor for clearer air. Panicky people cursed, screamed, raged, ranted, and banged their fists against the steel doors.

"Fuck!"

Cough!

"Fire!"

Cough!

"Terrorists!"

Cough!

"Anarchy!"

Cough!

"The end of the world!"

Wheeze!

"I knew we shouldn't have come here!"

Gasp!

"Give me that tissue!"

"Get your own tissue, bitch!"

Cough!

"Call 911!"

"Where's my phone?"

Cough! Gasp!

"Where are the firefighters?"

"Where are the police if you need them?"

"Stand back!" ordered one of the mayor's bodyguards.

"Freeze!" ordered another.

"Stand back!"

"Freeze!"

Wheeze!

"Stand back and freeze!"

Cough! Wheeze!

"Everybody, stay clear of his honor, or we'll fire!"

"The building has already been fired!"

Wheeze! Cough!

"I'm not even close to his honor!"

"Where does he have any honor?"

Gasp! Cough!

"Shut up! I bought his honor last week! A clean million into his Swiss bank account! Now it's strictly for the birds! What an irony, to die like this, together, like two rats!"

"Birds? Rats? Keep your imaginary zoo to yourself, or his honor will sue you! His honor doesn't have any bank account in Switzerland. He can't even find Switzerland on a map. He doesn't even know how to spell it."

"Who cares? He can't sue, 'cause we're all gonna die in here!"

"Gasp!"

"I never voted for that rat anyway."

"Who cares what you voted for? We're gonna die!"

Cough! Wheeze! Gasp!

"There ought to be a law against this shoddy construction!"

"There ought to be a law against these steel doors!"

"There ought to be a law against fires!"

Cough! Cough! Cough!

"Jesus, we're all gonna die!"

"Oh my god, the end is nigh!"

"Oh my god oh my god oh my god…"

"Yea, though I walk in death's dark vale, yet will I fear no ill. For thou art with me, and thy rod and staff me comfort still…"

Cough! Cough! Wheeze! Wheeze! Gasp! Gasp!

"Sam, I have a confession to make. I've been lying about my age for years. I'm not going to turn thirty next week. I'm turning forty."

"I know. I know. The divorce papers are in the mail."

Cough out loud!

"My poor hair! Oh, that damn smoke. It's going to ruin my hair!"

Rolling on the floor wheezing!

"Take the phone, Ferris, and say goodbye to the children!"

"Oh, come on. I know they're not my kids."

Cough-o-copter!

"Oh, those fucking terrorists!"

Cough! Cough! Wheeze! Wheeze! Gasp! Gasp!

In people's minds, the smoke grew into everybody's personal nightmare, be it fire, bombs, or poison gas. It became impossible to see anyone or anything more than a couple feet away.

Jennifer shook off her boyfriend's hand. "Where are the fire extinguishers?"

"There are some over there, but where's the fire? Maybe not such a great idea, blindly emptying the fire extinguishers into the ventilation ducts."

That moment, a busty brunette standing and coughing nearby, lacking a handkerchief, ripped off her blouse, sending buttons flying every which way, one hitting Traynor in the chest, and used it as a makeshift gas mask.

Through the smoke, Traynor watched her hooters strain against her bra and wobble with every cough. "Maybe coming here was not such a bad idea, after all. Too bad Nick isn't in here. He'd love that."

Coughing herself, Jennifer shot her boyfriend an icy glance. "You want me to compete on these terms?"

Traynor grinned. "Well, you'd be one step ahead of her, oh my braless wonder. Besides, she can't compete with you anyway."

"Thank you."

" 'Cause she isn't even blond."

"Thanks. I think."

Traynor drew his .45 Colt M1911 pistol and chambered a round. "Better 1911 than 911."

"Doesn't help much against the fire, though," cautioned his girlfriend.

Traynor coughed. "What fire? What about the burglar alarm and the steel doors? Looks more like a heist to me."

With the doors shut and the smoke, there seemed to be nothing they could do, except to be ready to defend themselves and to wait for the smoke exhaust system to cope and firefighters to fight the alleged fire and to open the doors. Through the smoke and the noises of the alarms and the charging mob, Jennifer and Traynor thought they heard a swishing sound from the center of the gallery. A shadowy figure clad all in black brushed past them. Jennifer gasped involuntarily. He or she — or it — had no face! There was nothing there but a dark blob of slime!

Buy the full story.

The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors, Chapter One, Part One

Chapter One

The Phantom of the Met

Kevin Traynor yawned.

Jennifer Jordan rolled her blue eyes, then looked up at the ceiling of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's new south wing. Not that she expected any help from anywhere up there. Yes, it was boring — but did her boyfriend always have to put on a show on what he thought about others?

"Serves you right," she hissed. "You kept me waiting for half an hour."

Traynor brushed his hand through his dark-blond hair before he put his arm around her, flashed a roguish grin across his angular face, and looked her disarmingly into the eyes.

His sparkling blue eyes utterly denied the importance of being earnest or late. "Not my fault. As I said, Nick had two tickets for the Foxy Boxing World Championship."

"He had tickets? I thought he ran that circus."

"Anyway, you could have moved the opening to another night. Could easily have been more than half an hour. Was hard enough to bum a ride off of Nick to get here from the Garden. He wanted to go backstage, comfort the losers, and celebrate with the winner."

Nothing good could come out of a serious argument with Kevin Traynor.

"But he did drive you here."

"I told him there would be chicks. By the way, you used to enjoy a good catfight in your day, if I may say so."

"My day? I have not yet begun to fight! Anyway, you better watch out. My sources keep telling me that The Great D'Ancy is in town."

"Rene D'Ancy, the famous French art thief?"

"The same. Rene Honore D'Ancy. He's a genius with disguises. You better watch out. Anybody in here could be D'Ancy. Hell, I could be D'Ancy."

"That, we'll find out tonight."

"I don't think so. After all, you could be D'Ancy."

"Would that make any difference? Anyway, rest assured I don't feel terribly D'Ancy tonight."

"At least try to be a little more vigilant."

"I can't help it. That guy's a walking, talking bromide. It's more interesting to watch paint dry — or for that matter, to watch these columns grow."

The speaker, a portly gray-haired gentleman by the name of Publius B. Vandam IV, droned on and on about how his great-granduncle, the noted progressive, reformer, and philanthropist, had been martyred on a cross of gold by those Gilded-Age robber barons. Vandam was the chief executive officer of the company that had designed the interiors and the lighting of the new galleries. Before Vandam, Leslie Ford, the museum director, had exhorted the audience that art was not a commodity, but a public trust.

Before Ford, one Geraldine "Jeri" Culpepper, an elderly socialite, culture vulture, and philanthropist apparently well-known among the Four Hundred, had lauded donors for contributing to the cultural cause, but urged them to match their donations dollar for dollar with charity for the poor. Traynor figured that she had inherited or married into her money. Now her guilty conscience was as black as her dress and gloves. She could not "give back" her unearned wealth fast enough — to those who had not given it to her. Well, her problem. The trouble was that she wanted to force her betters, those who had made their money, like Jennifer and Traynor, "to give it back" as well. To whom? To those who had not made it. And before her, there had been a long line of similar silver spoon socialist speakers Traynor had forgotten or repressed.

The new north and south wings of the museum had been paid for by a hundred-story apartment tower rising above each wing. First American Corporation had built the towers and the reinforced concrete shells of the museum wings on which they stood. Jennifer was First American's Vice President for Safety, Security, and Special Assignments, while Traynor, who had held that job before her, continued as a consultant.

However, the museum had insisted on awarding the contract for the interior design of the museum wings to Vandam Construction. After all, would it be fair for one multi-billion dollar corporation, and the world's largest at that, to monopolize the whole project? Moreover, Vandam was among the museum's most generous benefactors. Nevertheless, like his construction company was but a small part of the fortune he had inherited, his patronage of the arts was dwarfed by his charitable giving championing the poor, the underprivileged, and the disenfranchised. A philanthropist so public-spirited could not be ignored without a social backlash — in other words, without bad PR.

For Jennifer, her donation to the museum had been a chance to get her collection of Frank O'Connor paintings displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, much to the horror of every curator up to the director. Neither what he had called their "proto-fascist" provenance nor their amateurish technique had helped any. Ultimately, only Jennifer's thinly veiled threat that her position at First American permitted her to maneuver the Met Museum Towers project on a back burner through an uncharitable safety assessment had gotten her what she wanted. This had an even more horrified director gnashing his teeth, grudgingly permitting "those paintings" into his holy halls, half recognizing that she who pays the piper calls the tune, half rationalizing that one of the paintings having been featured on the cover of an enormously popular bestseller permitted a retrospective of the painter in the holy halls his paintings may in part have helped to build.

Consequently, the grand opening of the new wings was nothing short of an utter nightmare: Not only were there the usual inane speeches, but the silver spoon socialist speakers tried to outdo each other in their condemnation of the selfishness the O'Connors represented. The silver spoon socialists resented the fact that the new south wing would be named for First American's chief executive officer, whose name they scrupulously avoided to even mention. Culture vultures were furious that they had to thank what they called "those crass materialists" for the museum expansion, that they even had them materialists perch like eagles in their nests above the culture vulture haunt. But what they hated most was Jennifer's O'Connor paintings displayed on the wall of the sturdy column in the center of the windowless gallery, behind Vandam. They hated those paintings even more than they hated the fact that columns supporting the towers above intruded into the new museum galleries, which they believed they should have gotten for free.

The painting Traynor found most interesting, or frankly, the only one that aroused more than a passing interest in him, was Man Also Rises, Frank O'Connor's painting of a cityscape at dawn, which graced the cover of the twenty-fifth anniversary edition of The Fountainhead. Four white shafts of sunlight broke out of a gray cloud over a city skyline. In the foreground, the red steel frame of a skyscraper under construction rose through the right third of the painting. As Traynor loved the book and loved skyscrapers even more, he found the painting, however crude, appealing. Jennifer had purchased a couple more O'Connors, but to Traynor they constituted diminishing returns, and not only the one that was named thus.

Finally, Vandam having finished, the mayor launched himself into a flight of fancy extolling the nobility of public service. Mayor Mark Messing was as short and stocky as Ford was tall and slim. Together they looked like Mutt and Jeff. Apart from the mayor's head of carefully parted silvery hair, that is.

In contrast, Ford's tousled brown hair reminded Traynor of ruffled feathers. In fact, with a small head and a big nose shaped not unlike a toucan's bill, and a tendency to abruptly look hither and thither for imaginary smudges, scratches, chips, and tears on his treasures, the museum director did look like a bird on his perch. The two of them made for a preposterous picture. Traynor was chuckling inside. He could not look at the two of them for any length of time for fear of having to laugh out loud.

Read on…

Or buy the full story.

The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors

Now available for your Kindle: The Case of the Kidnapped O'Connors, the new Kevin Traynor mystery. A locked room mystery about art, anarchy, objectivity, and madness. Free to download tomorrow, June 13, 2013, midnight to midnight Pacific Time.

When his girlfriend's prized paintings are stolen from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Kevin Traynor has to find them fast, lest she slip from her usual objectivity and rationality into madness, mayhem, and murder. There is no lack of suspects — and no way how any human being can have smuggled the paintings out of that proverbial locked room. There simply is no explanation that is both rational and plausible. The hunt for the thief leads the couple into one dead end after another. It dawns on Traynor that the only way to find the thief is to find the paintings... But is he up against a mere mortal thief, or against The Phantom of the Met?

Kevin Traynor. With the right to be politically incorrect.

Censorship Goes Olympic

The latest Olympic sport? Censorship, apparently.

The apes that run the London Olympics believe they can forbid you from linking to their ugly, crappy, pathetic website if you say things about them that aren't nice.

Links to the Site. You may create your own link to the Site, provided that your link is in a text-only format. You may not use any link to the Site as a method of creating an unauthorized association between an organization, business, goods, or services and London 2012, and agree that no such link shall portray us or any other official London 2012 organizations (or our or their activities, products, or services) in a false, misleading, derogatory, or otherwise objectionable manner. 

OK, here's the link:

http://www.london2012.com/

The Olympics suck, they're run by a bunch of morons, and the only morons even dumber than the rank and file Olympic cow-orkers are those that wrote the terms of abuse.

Hmm… Maybe reverse psychology, though. Why would anyone otherwise link to that crummy website or care about that boring nonsense, anyway?

HT to David McElroy.

Take the Bohemian Test!

Now I know why that hipster test didn't work out: because I'm not a hipster, but a bohemian.

The Wikipedia article describes me to a T:

Bohemianism is the practice of an unconventional lifestyle, often in the company of like-minded people, with few permanent ties, involving musical, artistic, or literary pursuits. In this context, Bohemians can be wanderers, adventurers, or vagabonds.

This use of the word bohemian first appeared in the English language in the 19th century to describe the nontraditional lifestyles of marginalized and impoverished artists, writers, journalists, musicians, and actors in major European cities. Bohemians were associated with unorthodox or anti-establishment political or social viewpoints, which were often expressed through free love, frugality and — in some cases — voluntary poverty. A wealthy and privileged, even aristocratic, bohemian circle is sometimes referred to as the haut bohème ("high bohemians").

The term Bohemianism emerged in France in the early 19th century when artists and creators began to concentrate in the lower-rent, lower-class gypsy neighborhoods. Bohémien was a common term for the Romani people of France, who had reached Western Europe via Bohemia.

And you? Are you a bohemian?

Take Alex' 100% Accurate Bohemian Test!

Kevin Traynor Amazon UK Book Deal

Save on Kevin Traynor books with this hot new Amazon UK deal!

There are now much cheaper dead tree editions of Torch in the Night (£5.99 instead of £10.33), Phantom Train (£6.99 instead of £10.98), and Mysterious Boat (£7.99 instead of £12.91) available at Amazon UK, just like they are available at Amazon in the US. These editions are being rolled out across local Amazon websites in Continental Europe, too.

The new versions are identical to the old ones, except for minor changes to sizes of author picture and text on the back covers.

Happy reading!

Kevin Traynor on Shelfari

Torch in the Night, Phantom Train, Mysterious Boat, and Debacle are now featured on Shelfari, which has lists and descriptions of characters, organizations, and locations, tables of contents, and many more in-depth book details and facts and makes them available on the Shelfari website and as Book Extras on Kindle readers.

BTW, you don't need a Kindle reader to read Kindle e-books. You can download free reader software from Amazon and read Kindle e-books on your computer or smart phone. It's available for Windows, Mac, iPad, iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, and Windows Phone 7. Or you use the Kindle Cloud Reader to read Kindle e-books in your web browser. Plus, if you've got a laptop or a smart phone, you can even take it with you, like a Kindle reader.

Thus you can profit from the low prices of Kevin Traynor e-books and the free Book Extras without spending money on a Kindle reader. Nifty, huh?

Gunpowder Tea, Chapter One, Part Three

Begin with the beginning.

When Traynor was about to detour through that flower-filled strait between the low rises of the British Empire Building and La Maison Française, he stopped short and stepped over to the balustrade above the Sunken Plaza in front of the GE Building, his favorite spot in Midtown Manhattan. His gaze swept across the sunshades of the cafe in the plaza below, to the golden figure of Prometheus soaring above Mount Olympus and the zodiac, bathed in the waters of the fountains and the shine of the spotlights, holding high the sample of fire he had stolen from the gods. "Prometheus, teacher in every art, brought the fire that hath proved to mortals a means to mighty ends," stated the inscription on the granite wall behind the statue. Faced with the skyscrapers around him, Traynor could not but agree.

Another drink? After what had just happened, maybe not tonight. If he got kicked out of his other favorite hangout as well, he might start to feel drinks jinxed. He started to hum again.

Mine eyes have seen the number of the coming of the lord:
It is trampling out the vintage years whose heads are less than scored;
It hath loosed the fateful lightning of its terrible swift sword:
This truth is marching on.

Traynor just had to do something special before the summer and the millennium were over. Sure, the bean counters claimed the old millennium had another year's worth of blood in it, but someone who believed that the change from 2000 to 2001 would be more special than that from 1999 to 2000, someone who would not see the obvious, could not be trusted. Who cares if there was a year 0?

Anyway, whatever he did, whenever he did it, maybe he should not do it in the city, state, or even country where he tentatively intended to read law to one day help make it a little less asinine. If his rap sheet grew much longer, even his parents would not be able to protect him from getting disbarred before he ever got barred, uh, admitted to the bar. Five Flag Theory… He needed a place to play, a place where it would not matter if he ended up being a wanted man, uh, juvenile delinquent, in short, a place where he would never go again.

At the ass end of the Channel Gardens, Traynor turned north onto Fifth Avenue, his back to the Gothic pile of St. Patrick's Cathedral, and his head up at Atlas heroically propping up a hollow world below the International Building. One street crossing and one avenue crossing later, he (Traynor, not Atlas, although Traynor sure had an ego big enough for both) arrived at the bronze-colored box of Olympic Tower, now a black silhouette dotted with diamonds of light. His dad's duplex condo was on the upper floors. When Traynor entered the library off the living room on the upper level of the duplex, the red light of the answering machine on the desk was flashing. He pressed the appropriate button.

It was a message from his girlfriend. "Hi, you still recognize my voice? I'll be back soon, and then you can take me to that… Yadda, yadda, yadda."

That did not exactly make him a happy camper, as she was only a placeholder girlfriend. At first he had thought she looked all right and had a pleasant enough personality. However, it had not taken him long to decide that she was dull, unintelligent, a mees-tick, a dinner whore, jealous, and worst of all, not blond enough. Ah, hair the color of… He lost his train of thought.

She sounded like she expected him to pop the question, and failing that, would pop it herself. Would he go steady with her? Would he commit to an exclusive relationship? Well, he'd rather be committed.

Blech.

Did he look that stupid?

Traynor went over to the huge globe in a corner to play Atlas: He made the globe spin, closed his eyes, and stabbed it with his index finger, stopping it. He had stabbed some hole in the wall called Sidi Ifni, Morocco. Yet he let on he hit Casablanca. Sounded more romantic. Why not see Casablanca in color? Plus, Casablanca reminded him of his mom's latest entry in her series featuring Isabella, the white slave of Timbuktu. Let's pay Isabella a visit and see about those more or less oriental delights. He sat down at the computer to help put some travel agents out of work (as the looters would put it), or speed the transition to a new economy with better jobs for all (as the sane people put it).

Down in his room, a packing Traynor also packed the .45 Colt 1911 automatic pistol his dad had given him for his birthday some months before. Officially, the gun was still the property of his dad. Traynor senior had the connections to get any firearms license he wanted from City Hall. He was literally and semi-officially above the law. Hell, he could probably have gotten a license to drag a howitzer down Fifth Avenue, with the mayor and the police commissioner blocking traffic for him.

His son was not content to muddle through by gaming the system. He would do something about it. Either the system would change, or it would be overthrown. Traynor junior believed that all people should be equal before the law, and that you should not have to have connections to have the law recognize your rights. Those stupid laws better be changed pretty damn quick. However, he was not stupid enough to obey them while they were still in force, particularly not if obeying could get him killed. Change the law if possible — bend or ignore it if necessary. And he sure did not believe in sucking up to its custodians. The law was an ass. Fuck the law. He would be the most lawless lawyer in legal history.

He hid his Colt, some spare magazines, and some boxes of cartridges in cutouts in the foam padding between the inner and outer shells of his suitcase. Better safe than sorry. The checked baggage would not be screened. Chances that Casablanca customs would find these items were near nil. And if they found them, it would be a welcome opportunity for them to demand a small baksheesh. Or maybe not so small.

Traynor went up into the kitchen to leave a note mesmerized to the refrigerator for his mom and dad to find when they got back from a book tour and some sort of mercenary mission, respectively.

Folks:

Gone traveling. Will be back soon enough. (Don't hold your breath.)

Love and stuff,

Kevin

Traynor had a deal with his parents. They would not try to parent him as long he would not try to educate them. Savages said, "It takes a village to raise a child." The Traynor clan knew it takes no one. Only in a dysfunctional family, Traynor was sure, can you grow up to be a decent person.

Gunpowder Tea, Chapter One, Part Two

Begin with the beginning.



Nursing his Bostonian blue law blues, a cross Traynor crossed the cavernous elevator lobby and took one of the spacious express elevator cars down. Under his breath, he kept whistling "The Battle Hymn of the Republic."

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
Us boys are playing poker and the girls are shooting pool
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Offed Miss Pettigrew with a mousegun .32
And that old bat don't teach no more!

He left the cathedral-like tower lobby and marched through the subterranean mall to the subway station.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I have shot the secretary and I hung the principal
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Met her at the gate with a loaded .38
And the teacher don't teach no more!

The 1 train roared into the station; the doors parted. "This is a Bronx-bound 1 local train. The next stop is Chambers Street."

Traynor boarded the enemy vessel and stared down the passengers. The doors clicked shut, steel squealed on steel once more, and the train rumbled into the tunnel.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I have bound and gagged the principal and tossed him in the pool
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Shot him out the door with a Magnum .44
And the teacher don't teach no more!

"This is a Bronx-bound 1 local train. The next stop is Franklin Street."

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I slowly killed the principal at a quarter after two
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Took his fucking life with my old Colt .45
And the teacher don't teach no more!

"This is a Bronx-bound 1 local train. The next stop is Canal Street."

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I have barbecued the principal, destroyed the PTA
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Shot her up to heaven with an AK-47
And the teacher don't teach no more!

"This is a Bronx-bound 1 local train. The next stop is Houston Street."

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I have sliced the English teachers and have drowned them in their blood
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Shot him in the bean with my favorite M-16
And the teacher don't teach no more!

"This is a Bronx-bound 1 local train. The next stop is Christopher Street – Sheridan Square."

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I am killing all the teachers — I am breaking all the rules
The school is burning down!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Met her at the bank with a cool main battle tank
And the teacher don't teach no more!

"This is a Bronx-bound 1 local train. The next stop is Fourteenth Street."

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school
I have tortured every teacher — I have broken every rule
I have broken every piece of chalk as well as every rule
My truth is marching on!

Glory, glory, hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
Blasted him real mean with a nuclear submarine
And there ain't no teacher no more!

Unlike his truth, Traynor stopped marching around the subway car. Boy, he sure needed a vacation. He got off at Fiftieth Street and Broadway, turned east, and walked crosstown through Rockefeller Center. The dark canyon between the big boxes that were the Exxon and Time-Life Buildings lay deserted. He felt a bit naked without a gun. Even between the setback-riddled limestone slab of the GE Building and Radio City Music Hall the tourist count was low. Like moths, the few passersby were drawn to the bright floodlights of the Channel Gardens.

Read on…

Gunpowder Tea, Chapter One, Part One

Chapter One

Where Nobody Knows Your Name

New York City, the last summer of the millennium.

The setting sun shed its last golden rays on the little Statue of Liberty far, far below, out in the harbor. Big black ships and little white boats, both as tiny as matches, crisscrossed its waters with their wake trails. Beyond the harbor and the twin black blotches of Liberty and Ellis Islands, the as black flatlands of New Jersey, intersected by inlets and waterways, stretched into a golden infinity.

On the other side, a vast rectangle of sun-gilded silvery columns stretched out and down until they too blurred into rows of matches. Atop Tower Two the tourists' cameras started to flash, and would not cease until the observation decks closed for the night. There sure was a reason why the southeastern quadrant of the one acre of Manhattan real estate that was the 107th floor of One World Trade Center was called The Greatest Bar on Earth and why it was Kevin Traynor's favorite hangout in all New York.

This side of the narrow floor-to-ceiling windows was pandemonium. Actually, it wasn't really pandemonium. Even on this Friday night, the bar was only moderately busy at this early hour. There were still some seats and barstools available, and only a couple junior investment bankers released from their cubicles were doing their antics on the small dance floor. It only felt like pandemonium to a Traynor who did not feel like dealing with people tonight. But like the game was safest below the barrel of the hunter's rifle, the multitude of the eight million constituted the best guarantee of anonymity for Traynor. Give or take a cougar or two to be dodged.

Tonight, a tequila sunrise and Traynor were celebrating the night his high school had closed for the summer. As far as he was concerned, it ought to be closed down and burned down for good. He raised his glass to its eternal burning in the hell of nasty institutions.

Yet for Traynor, favorite spot or not, The Greatest Bar on Earth was no safe bet, either. He constituted a decidedly endangered species up here. While the tourists atop the tower's twin continued to flash their cameras across the canyon, Traynor flashed the fake ID his dad had given him in recognition of passing grades.

"You don't look twenty-five." The waitress frowned formidably under her frizzy black hair tied into something midway between a sloppy bun and a severe pony tail.

"Not the first time I hear that, not the last." Traynor looked at the ID. He found it quite convincing and would almost have believed he was an adult.

She stormed off in a huff. Fortunately, the tower had been designed to withstand hurricanes, so there was little damage she could do.

But to Traynor she could cause no end of trouble: She returned without his second drink, but with a little something or rather someone else. "I'm sorry, but my supervisor has to examine your ID."

Supervisor. In a fucking bar. Even if it was, in name and in fact, the greatest bar on earth. A fucking bartender. The fucking bartender following on the fucking heels of the fucking tequila dolly held out his fucking hand, demanding Traynor's fucking ID.

Traynor cocked his head. "What?"

"Could I see your ID?"

"I showed it to your little friend."

"You'll have to show it to me, too, and good, if you want another drink. After all, you don't look twenty-one, much less twenty-five."

Traynor flashed the waitress a grin. "Hey, I told you it wouldn't be the last time."

Now the bartender frowned forebodingly as well. "Please?"

"I can't."

"You just showed it to me."

Shut up, dolly, I'm talking to your "supervisor," thought Traynor. "Uh, I swallowed it. I don't believe in IDs. It's an un-American concept."

"Then I believe your next drink will be orange juice straight. You swallow your ID, you don't swallow alcohol. Underage drinking is un-American, too. "

"No. It's America's number one teen sport. It's just un-puritan. Puritan is un-American."

The bar boss looked at Traynor like he was not sure whether to call the pigs to have him arrested for un-underage activities or the men in white coats to have him hauled off to a nice, safe padded cell. Public order was sure to collapse once Traynor's views took hold.

Traynor shook his head. "Maybe you can't see Boston from here, but you sure can smell it."

"Huh?"

"Don't bother. The check, please."

Read on…

Introducing Young Kevin Traynor

Over the next couple months, I will write and serialize in these pages Gunpowder Tea, the first story in the Young Kevin Traynor series, which will reveal how everything began.

Stay tuned for Kevin Traynor's very first adventure!

Kevin Traynor, Warrior Prince?

Been reading up on Beowulf last night. Looks like those Dark Ages warriors had a more enlightened idea of corporate identity than today's wage slaves.

Although Hrothgar and Beowulf are portrayed as morally upright and enlightened Pagans, they fully espouse and frequently affirm the values of Germanic heroic poetry. In the poetry depicting warrior society, the most important of human relationships was that which existed between the warrior — the thane — and his lord, a relationship based less on subordination of one man's will to another's than on mutual trust and respect. When a warrior vowed loyalty to his lord, he became not so much his servant as his voluntary companion, one who would take pride in defending him and fighting in his wars. In return, the lord was expected to take care of his thanes and to reward them richly for their valor.

This is actually quite a good description of the relationship between Kevin Traynor (and his thane colleagues, like Nick Parker) and his bosses at First American Corporation.

Wage slaves of the world, arise! Fire your pointy-haired bosses and live like warrior princes!

Big Gaffe Eats Small Gaff

"Perry gaffe overshadows defiant Cain, Romney scrutiny," opines MSNBC writer Michael O'Brien.

He goes on to elaborate:

While a CNBC debate featured the most scrutiny to date of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's economic plans, and was highlighted by Herman Cain's first debate appearance since the emergence of sexual harassment against him, a gaffe from the Texas governor took center stage and threatened to crystallize Republicans' concerns about his candidacy.

True, what is going on is the sexual harassment of Herman Cain at the hands of some deluded women. But I suspect O'Brien did reveal this truth only involuntarily. He probably meant to write: "since the emergence of sexual harassment charges against him."

This one typo would be funny and ironic on its own, but O'Brien continues:

"The American people deserve better than someone being tried in the court of public opinion based on unfounded accusations," Cain said to wild cheers in the early moments of the debate. "This country's looking for leadership, and this is why a lot of people, despite what has happened over the last nine days … the voters have voted with their dollars, and they are saying we they don't care about character assasination -- they care about leadership and getting this economy gooing and all the other problems that we face."

I'll overlook the fact that he can't spell "assassination," but I submit that the economy is already gooed up enough as it is.

Looks like MSNBC shortened its deadlines way too much lately. I wonder whether they are keeping their writers chained down in the dungeon now?

And they call us pajamas media. At least I'm wearing my pajamas. MSNBC's word slaves are probably naked in their dungeon.

Debacle: Failing to Rebuild the Twin Towers at Amazon.com

The dead tree edition of Debacle: Failing to Rebuild the Twin Towers is now available from Amazon.com or direct from the book's online store. This edition contains two bonus essays that are not found in the present Kindle edition.

Kevin Traynor 4-for-3

At the moment, all books of the first Kevin Traynor trilogy are part of the Amazon.com 4-for-3 promotion. Buy all three Kevin Traynor books plus another book (how about Democracy Society?) and get the cheapest one for free.

Here the qualifying editions:

Torch in the Night

Phantom Train

Mysterious Boat

How about Democracy Society as the fourth book? If you like Traynor, you're probably gonna like this one, too.

Reporting Evil Patriots to Attack Watch

Hey, Obama, I want to snitch on my parents. They say you're a communist.

Hey, Obama, I'm looking for the office of the Thought Police.

Hey, Obama, they say your IQ is 70, 35 in the morning and 35 in the evening.

Hey, Obama, they say you need an ear job.

Hey, Obama, they say you're dumber than either the shrub or Palin and have done more to destroy America than both of them together.

Hey, Obama, my fellow entrepreneurs say they won't hire anybody as long as they don't know what Obamacare will cost them.

Hey, Obama, they say you defrauded investors and handed GM to your union buddies/sponsors.

Hey, Obama, they say you fell out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down.

Hey, Obama, they say you fell out of the idiot tree and hit every branch on the way down.

Hey, Obama, all my friends are libertarians, i.e., by your definition, domestic terrorists. Where can I report them?

Hey, Obama, I'm an anarcho-capitalist. Where can I report myself?

Hey, Obama, they say there are gremlins in your computer. Watch out!

Hey, Obama, they say you're dumber than you're ugly.

Hey, Obama, they say you, Papa Smurf, and Karl Marx are one and the same person.

Hey, Obama, my telescreen is on the fritz. You can't see me anymore. Help!

Hey, Obama, there's plenty of stuff on right-wing blogs that needs to go down the memory hole.

Hey, Obama, do you know that your new website sports the nazi colors?

Hey, Obama, you're late: 1984 has come and gone.

Hey, Obama, my neighbor Winston Smith has smashed his telescreen.

Hey, Obama, they say you should read a book called "Atlas Shrugged."

Hey, Obama, I want to report my latest book, "Mysterious Boat." It's full of evil anarchic right-wing stuff. Can you refute it?

Hey, Obama, the paper your book is printed on is way too tough.

Hey, Obama, they say you should publish your scribblings on toilet paper, so it has some use.

Hey, Obama, the exchange rate fluctuations caused by your insane policies have hurt my business. Will you give me a refund? After all, you have money for this here kind of shit.

Hey, Obama, they say you're second only to FDR as the worst president ever.

Hey, Obama, they say you could benefit from economics lessons from a Valley Girl.

Hey, Obama, they say you believe in shovel ready projects.

Hey, Obama, is this the website for Nobama for America?

Hey, Obama, I want to donate to your cause. I have a snail shell and two pieces of pocket lint.

Hey, Obama, I want to thank you for solving the immigration problem. Since you ruined the country, no one wants to come anymore.

Hey, Obama, I'll be rooting for you in 2012. The Republican candidates are all bigger morons than you.

Hey, Obama, where can I join the Junior Spies and the Youth League?

Hey, Obama, they say you look like the backside of a donkey.

Hey, Obama, they say it's impossible to smear you: Whatever one says, the truth is worse.

Hey, Obama, the rich say you're already looting enough of the wealth they produce.

Hey, Obama, the rich say they will move to a place called Galt's Gulch.

Hey, Obama, the rich say they're gonna do some seasteading. Let me explain this to you: They all move on a big cruise ship, which means you and the other losers can then go tax each other.

Hey, Obama, the rich say they're gonna pay their fair share. Here it is:

Debacle: Failing to Rebuild the Twin Towers Out Now

Friends, Americans, civilized humans, lend me your eyes; I come to praise the WTC, not to bury it. The evil that men do lives after them; the good should not be interred with their bones: nor should it be with the bones of the Twin Towers. The vile Caesars have told you the Twin Towers were ambitious: If it was so, it was not a grievous fault, but their noblest virtue. But grievously hath Caesar answered it.

World trade means world peace… The World Trade Center is a living symbol of man's dedication to world peace. Beyond the compelling need to make this a monument to world peace, the World Trade Center should, because of its importance, become a representation of man's belief in humanity, his need for individual dignity, his beliefs in the cooperation of men, and through cooperation, his ability to find greatness.

— Minoru Yamasaki

Is it beauty and genius they want to see? Do they seek a sense of the sublime? Let them come to New York, stand on the shore of the Hudson, look and kneel. When I see the city from my window — no, I don't feel how small I am — but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would like to throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body.

— Ayn Rand

Those awesome symbolic towers that speak of liberty, human rights, and humanity have been destroyed. They have gone up in smoke.

— Osama bin Laden

Ten years ago today, murderous terrorists crashed jetliners into the Word Trade Center Towers, realizing their plan that the Twin Towers that stood for rational man's achievement, capitalism, freedom, free trade, and world peace should no longer grace the New York skyline, aiming to extinguish the twin beacons of liberty and enlightenment, so that the forces of darkness should rule the world once more.

The terrorists have failed, as rule by faith and force must always fail. They have not brought about another Dark Age. But they murdered 3,000 human beings, wrecked four jetliners, prompted people to sacrifice priceless liberties to fear, caused economic damage in the trillions of dollars, and destroyed two landmark building complexes.

Some of these battles are battles for another day and not the primary subject of our book. But on September 12, 2001, there was little doubt as to what had to be done about one of these points. The landmark complex less completely destroyed, the Pentagon, was quickly restored. To this day, people from around the US and the world are shocked to learn that what is built at the WTC is not new Twin Towers, taller, stronger, and safer.

For ten wasted years now, the worst of contemporary politics has made sure that no towers of comparable stature are rising at the WTC, thus kept the killers' legacy intact and respected their wish that New York and America be cut down to size, never to rise again.

Groups that favored drastically different philosophies of urban design, groups that saw professional opportunities for themselves, and groups that saw any pool of funds dedicated to relief of the needy as best devoted to their own priorities swooped in to claim they spoke for all.

Allied to this was the most vocal proportion of those who had lost loved ones in the attacks, casting about in their grief for solace. Whether seeking to blame someone for their loss or seeking maximum public recognition of their loss, they made pleas of a kind rare in previous historical disasters that often amounted to leaving the site as the killers of their loved ones had desired rather than permitting it to be reclaimed for the purposes to which and for which their loved ones had given their lives.

To the vulture-like opportunists seeing an opportunity to remake the city, and to the emotionally devastated seeking to see its unmaking left as a tribute to the victims, the officials listened. To the wider nation anxious to see the restoration of what could be restored, they paid no heed.

— Louis Epstein, World Trade Center Restoration Movement

WTC leaseholder Larry Silverstein has been determined to rebuild the office space, but lacks the vision and vigor to rebuild the towers he had once said he lusted for, towers he could only buy, but not create. He prefers the bulk of the iconic Twin Towers to be broken down into a bunch of buildings each half the size of a Twin Tower, to be built at a pace that minimizes his economic risk.

Moreover, he won't permit any new building at the WTC to have nearly as many occupied floors as the 110-story Twin Towers, as he now believes he has to protect the people who would work there from themselves.

All new WTC buildings now planned or under construction are much smaller and shorter than the Twin Towers, with the exception of the antenna on the new One WTC, which will be slighter taller than the old antenna. Thanks to officials' incompetence, there will not even be a new Windows on the World restaurant.

While politicians made sure that the public was never offered a poll pitting the stunted designs preferred by the interests they catered to — victims' families, urban utopian planners, and Silverstein — against restored Twin Towers, any poll there was soundly rejected the official offerings, which never managed to beat "none of the above" and usually took a shellacking from "none of the above."

Results on Imagine New York (the LMDC's official poll):
Libeskind: 205 votes / 26%
THINK: 260 votes / 33%
None of the above: 323 votes / 41%
Total: 788 votes

Results on NY1:
Results since February 4, 2003
Libeskind: 6,853 votes / 21%
THINK: 4,615 votes / 14%
I don't like either of these plans: 20,892 votes / 64%
Total: 32,360 votes

Results on CNN:
Which of the two finalists' designs do you prefer for the World Trade Center site?
Libeskind: 33,050 votes / 32%
THINK: 34,867 votes / 34%
Neither is good: 35,747 votes / 34%
Total: 103,664 votes

The incompetent and intellectually bankrupt officials have seen their WTC plans fall apart again and again for ten years because they treated the WTC rebuilding as a random office development with a memorial plopped in and failed to heed the most fundamental advice for great architecture:

Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood and probably will themselves not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will not die.

— Daniel H. Burnham

The human beings we lost were bold. These people deserve majestic new towers as bold as they were. One of the best ways we can honor them is to carry on their work. Safer, taller towers will be a living testament that complements our memorial and helps make it one of the seven modern wonders of the world. We need a skyline that does justice to the wonderful people we lost. We will not sell these people short.

— Jonathan Hakala, tenant, One World Trade Center

In the words of New Yorkers from all walks of life, Debacle: Failing to Rebuild the Twin Towers chronicles their love of their city and their towers, their hopes for rebuilding, their experience with the corrupt official rebuilding process, and the blueprints that can still restore tall Twin Towers to the WTC.

Debacle: Failing to Rebuild the Twin Towers is now available for Amazon Kindle. Dead tree edition coming soon.