Global Warming Fun 5: It’s a Dry Heat
Gary J. Davies
Global Warming Fun 5:
It's a Dry Heat
By
Gary J. Davies
Global Warming Fun 5: It's a Dry Heat
Copyright 2016 Gary J. Davies
Thank you for downloading this e-book. This book is the copyrighted property of the author and may not be reproduced, scanned, or distributed for any commercial or non-commercial use without permission from the author. Quotes used in reviews are the only exception. No alteration of content is allowed. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy.
This e-book is a work of fiction created by the author and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are a production of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously. Thank you for downloading this e-book!
Contents
Forward
Chapter 1: Mary's Last Wish
Chapter 2: Leaving, On a Jet Plane
Chapter 3: LAX?
Chapter 4: Old Students
Chapter 5: The Enslaved Stone-Coat
Chapter 6: Escape to Bakersfield
Chapter 7: The Big Trees
Chapter 8: The Park
Chapter 9: Zombies!
Chapter 10: Silicon Valley
Chapter 11: San Francisco
Chapter 12: The Golden Gate
Chapter 13: Wine Country and Trees
Chapter 14: Giants on the Beach
Chapter 15: Furry Forrest Dwellers
Chapter 16: Loss and Transference
Chapter 17: A New Beginning
About Other Publications by This Author
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Forward
That's 'fun' about global warming? Very little, unfortunately, as measured in lives or dollars, but I felt that it presented challenging writing opportunities that some readers might also appreciate. As far as climate change goes, I try to stick as close as practicable to the science as it is currently imperfectly known, though I have chosen to adopt what is hopefully a worse-case scenario. It is unfortunate that reality can form such a nasty backdrop for a fictional series. However reality is a dangerous place to be; it is what it is, whether we like it or not. If you happen to not 'believe' in climate change, go for example to the NASA website for some depressingly bad news. I leave it as an exercise for the enlightened reader to discern what parts of this story reflect fact based science Vs what is science-tinted fiction Vs what is pure fantasy. The key goal here entertainment, not enlightenment.
This novel is the fifth in a planned series of approximately ten short stories and/or novellas (this particular series element inadvertently grew to novel length) that when complete will also (hopefully) at some future date be merged to comprise one seamless epic novel that will be absurdly long even when redundancy is removed. The declared general plan/writing challenge is for each story in the series to provide a glimpse of both typical and critical events amid an increasingly unstable world in which natural, technological and perhaps mythical forces are being unleashed due to climate change and other human induced problems.
The writing challenge is formidable. From a human perspective climate changes much slower than grass grows: over a period of many centuries, though from geological and evolutionary perspectives the timeframe of the event is unfortunately short. The expected world-wide impact is almost unimaginable - a train wreck in super slow motion. Even a series of stories with a plot that takes place over centuries can hardly begin to do justice to the event. But I'll do my best.
Though more or less remaining true to its original concept as discussed most extensively in the first series volume, this series has morphed to be primarily the story of immortal telepathists Ed Rumsfeld and Jerry Green, Jerry's gene-spliced/edited sentient ants (jants; introduced in the first story), and sentient rock creatures known as Stone-Coats (stone creatures inspired by Mohawk legend; introduced in the second story). Notably there are also the med-ticks, introduced in the third story.
The progression of climate change provides the ever evolving setting for this series. This fifth story of the Global Warming Fun series takes place five years after the forth story: over forty years after the mid 2020's start of the series. In it Ed Rumsfeld takes his aging wife Mary to visit California, which has undergone radical transformation: climate-wise to a significant degree, but even more so politically and culturally. Like the other series elements this one illuminates a brief snippet in time. The sixth release in this series will take place in New York City, the last will take place on a distant human-settled Earth-like planet.
In addition to cheerfully and patiently waiting for unknown ages to see how this lengthy series unfolds and finally ends, you may wish in the meantime to read an already completed full-length novel. (What a novel idea!) See the 'About Other Publications by This Author' section at the end of this e-book for a brief description of other E-books published by this author, including a brief description of each of the previous releases of the Global Warming Fun series.
I am indebted to numerous information sources, most found on the internet (including Wiki and Edge websites) for knowledge about the Mohawk, climate change, and many other concepts used in this series. As always I thank my wife and daughters for putting up with all this writing nonsense, Bill Gates for his useful Word spell-checker that makes even physics-trained engineers passable spellers, and my favorite author James P. Blaylock for his early inspiringly silly fabulist fantasy writings. Please bring back the elves, James!
I wish also to thank the makers of Paint-dot-NET, the freeware which supports my awkwardly challenging but enjoyable creation of what are (hopefully) nifty little e-book covers. The covers of my books, like the writing and editing, are mine/my fault. My KISS philosophy with regard to covers remains to as much as possible design them to be simple, illuminating, legible, amusing, and attention getting even though these little eye-charts are usually displayed at only three to six centimeters high.
Happy reading to all!
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Global Warming Fun 5:
It's a Dry Heat
