And I think that’s pretty much right. When I’m writing fiction, I leave contemporary politics at the door, because among other things, as a reader, I hate being lectured on politics in the guise of fiction. Don’t like to read it, don’t plan on writing it.

I’m not only conservative, I’m best described as Hamiltonian. But to expect that authors pander to my politics and jurisprudence when I’m not reading political books is ridiculous.

I liked Old Man’s War, and Ghost Brigades – and this column. If I wanted political fiction, there are countless other spots on the internet to frequent – and I moderate one of them. But fiction, of the sort in which Scalzi excels, is one area where I don’t want any politics to interfere.

Support Gore, even the Nobel Prize Committee, however ridiculous some of their awards have been. Until such time as your books become nothing more than vehicles for your politics, I’ll be reading them. (Granted, I take most out of the library, but law school loans are hellish)

So authors are never supposed to offend readers? Ever? You know what they call authors like that? Bad writers.

The authors of some of my favorite books have been considered offensive by many: George Orwell, Joseph Heller, John Irving, William Styron, Armistead Maupin, Philip K. Dick, Kurt Vonnegut, Sue Miller, etc.

Were these writers paid to be offensive? Not initially, at least not all of them. But isn’t it amazing that a significant portion of their first work published – much of which rightfully became classics – contained “offensive” content which drew more and more readers to their subsequent work? Some of those readers even paid good money for those books.

I know the argument you were trying to make, JP, but it’s a bad and poorly made argument.

BTW, I get paid to be a secretary, but I put in a significant amount of “spare time” working as a political activist. I guess that means I can only ever write about being a secretary (or, in former lives, sales coordinator, sales analyst, accounts receivable analyst, etc.) and I can never write about my volunteer work as a political activist, because I might accidentally offend someone. Though I did make actual money managing a congressional campaign website last year. Do I have your permission to write about that? Please?

Oh, and re: Gore? Good on him. I’ll admit that I don’t entirely agree with the whole carbon offset thing, but I think he’s done a fantastic job bringing global warming to the forefront. With all the awards he’s won this year, I suppose he’s next up for the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards.

This Scalzi fella should get his own damn web site, I say.

Well, JP, you can think what you like about OSC’s political opinions, I don’t think they’re generally worth reading at all. So I don’t read the columns on his site. But that doesn’t stop me from buying his books and enjoying them.

Given that that bookstore will probably put the copy out on the shelf before returning it to the publisher, doing this may actually increase Scalzi’s sales, if only by one. :-)

Off to Eritrea* are we?

* Note for the hyperbole-and-humour-challenged: That was a joke.