Wednesday 13 March 2024

Pi Day 2024 –A Really Big PI-related near integer

Pi Day 2024 –A Really Big PI-related near integer

There is a really good Youtube channel done by a math prof that I follow on Youtube, Richard E. Borcherds. I will have a little more to say about him later, but first I will discuss the Pi-related content in one of his videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9k_QmZbwX8

I won’t attempt to get into any high-level explanation, as that would involve very advanced abstract algebra, which is far above the pay grade of a lowly retired statistician. That said, I did take one university-level abstract algebra course long ago and can confidently say that this type of math is very abstract indeed. Stats degrees are usually heavy on calculus, linear algebra and probability, not so much on abstract algebra. Arguably though, these subjects are all inter-related, though most of us can only learn so much math in one lifetime.

 


Anyway, the screenshot above shows a couple of very big numbers:

  • the exact integer: 262537412640768000.

  • the near integer: 262537412640768143.99999999925...

As you can see, the second number is quite close to the first number, up until the last 3 digits before the decimal point. They differ by almost 144.

And here is the Pi Day angle: that number is e raised to the power Pi times the square root of 163, and it nearly comes out to an integer, with the first 12 places after the decimal point being 9s. So, that’s a transcendental number taken to the power of another transcendental number multiplied by an irrational number. Given that these are numbers that are non-repeating and non-ending, that seems pretty weird.

The professor notes that a normal pocket calculator will actually show an integer after doing the calculation.

Even better, a Windows-based spreadsheet shows the result to 20 places past the decimal, as an integer.

And here is what the stats language R does. It just rounds the number, long before getting to the decimal. There are some R packages that handle really big numbers, but I couldn’t get any of them to work, so we will have to leave it at that.


Professor Borcherds recommends a particular online calculator, called free42, which emulates a particular high-level HP calculator on the PC. It looks interesting.

Apparently Martin Gardner (who wrote a recreational math column for Scientific American back when it was good) claimed that this was an integer, though Ramanujan had an accurate calculation of this number around a century ago, showing that it was not an integer.

 

The professor goes on to show a few more numbers involving e to the Pi times the square root of some other numbers, that end in a remarkable run of 9s, though not so spectacular as the first one.


You are probably now getting the feeling that something is going on here that is much more than a coincidence. And you would be right.

From this point, the explanation gets into elliptic modular function theory and other highly complicated areas of math. 

 


You can see that this all involves mathematics with complex numbers, which is where the factor of Pi sneaks in (note the presence of e to the 2 Pi in some of those formulas).

The video then segues into a number of areas, touching on some more of Ramanujan’s work, as well as Euler’s. These involves number theory (primes), as well as group theory. Eventually, the aptly named “Monster Group” makes an appearance. This object exists in 198663 dimensions, and has order 10 to the 53.  Here's a SF comic book that makes use of the concept (though with some slight errors).


This all seems rather esoteric, but these matters do come up in “sort-of” practical endeavors such as particular physics (group theory) and cosmology (string theory in 26 dimensions).

It turns out that Richard Borcherds actually was a co-winner of the Fields Medal, based on work related to the monster group. I didn’t know that when I stumbled over his Youtube channel and watched a bunch of videos on complex analysis and group theory. Then I picked up a book that I have about the Monster (just a recreational math book) and there he was! For those who don’t know, the Fields Medal is similar in status to the Nobel prizes, maybe more so, as the Fields are only handed out once every four years.

The professor’s videos are quite compelling and often rather oddly amusing. So, I would definitely recommend his channel if you are interested in math, even if the videos are probably something of a stretch for most of us.

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So, now that you have dutifully read some Pi Day math, you should read a science fiction book, or even better, a whole series. Book 1 of the Witches’ Stones series even includes a reference to pi.:

Kati of Terra

How about trying Kati of Terra, the 3-novel story of a feisty young Earth woman, making her way in that big, bad, beautiful universe out there.

So, go on a romantic adventure, a sort of spaceship and planet-side road trip, while escaping from dangerous slavers, with our gal Kati of Terra and her companion Mikal (and, of course her ever helpful but cantankerous Granda node):


 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00811WVXO

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00811WVXO


The Witches’ Stones

Or, you might prefer, the trilogy of the Witches’ Stones (they’re psychic aliens, not actual witches), which follows the interactions of a future Earth confederation, an opposing galactic power, and the Witches of Kordea. It features Sarah Mackenzie, another feisty young Earth woman).


 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008PNIRP4

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B008PNIRP4


The Magnetic Anomaly: A Science Fiction Story

“A geophysical crew went into the Canadian north. There were some regrettable accidents among a few ex-military who had become geophysical contractors after their service in the forces. A young man and young woman went temporarily mad from the stress of seeing that. They imagined things, terrible things. But both are known to have vivid imaginations; we have childhood records to verify that. It was all very sad. That’s the official story.”

A short story of about 6000 works.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0176H22B4

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0176H22B4





The Zoo Hypothesis or The News of the World: A Science Fiction Story

In the field known as Astrobiology, there is a research program called SETI, The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. At the heart of SETI, there is a mystery known as The Great Silence, or The Fermi Paradox, named after the famous physicist Enrico Fermi. Essentially, he asked “If they exist, where are they?”.


Some quite cogent arguments maintain that if there was extraterrestrial intelligence, they should have visited the Earth by now. This story, a bit tongue in cheek, gives a fictional account of one explanation for The Great Silence, known as The Zoo Hypothesis. Are we a protected species, in a Cosmic Zoo? If so, how did this come about? Read on, for one possible solution to The Fermi Paradox.

The short story is about 6300 words, or about half an hour at typical reading speeds.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076RR1PGD

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B076RR1PGD







Thursday 29 February 2024

Calculating Excess Deaths – Problems with the New U.K. Methodology

Calculating Excess Deaths – Problems with the

 New U.K. Methodology

Below are some concerns about the latest U.K. modelling of “excess deaths”. The general point I am making is that the new method seems to be answering a question (forecasting current year-over-year changes in unexpected deaths) that is peripheral to the research question that everyone is asking:

Why are excess deaths so high:

  • now in the post-Covid period (much of 2022, 2023, 2024),

  • compared to what they were during the main Covid (2020,2021, some of 2022)

  • and before Covid (say 2015-2019))?

A quick note about me, the analyst who wrote this critique: I worked for about 40 years as a statistician/data scientist, splitting my time between the Ontario provincial government in Canada and a large western Canadian research university. That time included using and developing population projection methods, building regression models, and developing specialized mathematical modelling techniques. Not to mention, plenty of descriptive reporting.

Naturally, these are my opinions and don't represent the views of past or present employers.  In a follow-up blog, I will use the numbers provided by ONS to estimate the changes in death rates during these periods, and compare the latter periods to the former.

Problems with the new Model

The bolded comments are from the document Estimating excess deaths in the UK, methodology changes: February 2024 (Office of National Statistics, United Kingdom).  In a few places, I have added underscores for emphasis. My comments follow in non-bold type.

  • This statistical model provides the expected number of deaths registered in the current period, if trends in mortality rates remained with the same as those from recent periods and in the absence of extraordinary events affecting mortality, such as the peak of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.”

    • This is not the question in most people’s minds. With this model, a portion of the rise in deaths due to Covid, Covid lock-downs and Covid vaccines becomes “baked in the cake” and this are no longer considered excess deaths. They are the new normal. Thus, the effects of Covid, Covid lock-downs and Covid vaccines on the death counts is attenuated by the method and partially obscured.

  • Each model is fitted to five years of data with a lag of one year from the end of the fitting period to the current period, so the expected number deaths in each week or month has its own five-year baseline period. For example, when estimating the expected number of deaths in January 2024, the model will be fitted to data spanning February 2018 to January 2023.”

    • Problem: With this method, increased deaths in 2023 (for example) are diminished in importance. Deaths in the years 2018 to 2023 are now normalized, so that excess deaths in 2023 are reduced, since the new calculation “expects” them, based on the deaths in the previous 5 years, which were high by historical standards.

    • So, this method answers a research question that is not the research question that interests most people (i.e. how does the number of deaths in 2023 compare with the number of deaths during the pre-pandemic period, This gives an (admittedly rought) indication of the effects of the pandemic, pandemic lock-downs and pandemic vaccinations. The new method might be useful for forecasting excess deaths, from one year to the next, but that’s not the main thing that interests most people.

  • When using a quasi-Poisson regression model, modelling the number of deaths as the dependent variable, and including the natural logarithm of population size as an offset term is analogous to modelling the mortality rate in each age-sex-geography stratum.”

    • As noted above, this modelling may be useful for current year planning purposes, but it doesn’t address the main issue, which is how did the death counts differ from pre-pandemic years, to pandemic years, to post-pandemic years. For most people, that is the main concern. The method tends to reduce the “excess deaths” count, which raises suspicions. i.e. is that the real intent of the new methodology?

    • It is akin to a population projection model, which is a valid tool, but does not lead to understanding of the dynamics driving the process (in this case, long-Covid, Covid lock-down side effects and Covid vaccine adverse efficts).

  • In our current approach to estimating excess deaths in England and Wales, and that of the devolved administrations of Scotland and Northern Ireland, the expected (baseline) number of deaths is estimated as the average number of deaths registered in a recent five-year period. In contrast, our new methodology is based on age-specific mortality rates rather than death counts, so trends in population size and age structure are accounted for. Furthermore, the five-year average mortality rate is adjusted for a trend, so historical changes in population mortality rates are also accounted for.

    • The use of a “time-trend” variable such as this one, seems to ‘hand-wave’ away and obscure the point in question, which is precisely the “historical changes in population mortality rates”. What are the trends and what is causing them?

  • The new and current methods produce estimates of excess deaths with similar trends and seasonal patterns over the nine-year period before the coronavirus pandemic, 2011 to 2019 (Figure 1). From 2011 to 2013, estimates from the new method are generally higher than those from the current method. However, estimates from the new method are consistently lower than those from the current method from 2015 onwards, particularly in 2019.”

    • People will naturally be suspicious of a new methodology that results in more unexpected deaths in the pre-pandemic period and fewer unexpected deaths in the pandemic and post-pandemic periods. This will lead to speculations that the government is trying to diminish concerns and therefore partially absolve itself of responsibility for increased excess deaths in the latter periods (which are the periods that people actually care about).

  • The new and current methods estimate similar numbers of excess deaths during the pandemic (Figure 2). In particular, the two approaches produce similar peaks in estimated excess mortality in the second quarter of 2020 and the winter of 2020 to 2021. However, estimates from the new method are generally lower than those from the current method throughout the latest year, 2023, by an increasing amount.”

On an annual basis, the new method estimates 76,412 excess deaths in the UK in 2020, compared with 84,064 estimated by the current method (Table 2). For context, the highest number of excess deaths estimated by the new method over the nine years before the pandemic is 30,858 in 2015. In the latest year, 2023, the new method estimates 10,994 excess deaths in the UK, 20,448 fewer than the current method.”

    • What else can one say, other than “this seems rather convenient” (from the government's point of view, anyway).

  • These increasing trends in population size and ageing, and the generally decreasing trend in mortality rates, are not accounted for by the current methodology for estimating excess deaths. However, they are reflected in the new methodology.”

    • This issue strikes one as something of a red herring, in terms of the question of excess deaths in the 2020 and beyond period compared to the five years before that. Though population growth and population aging generally will lead to more deaths, over these time-scales the effect would not be all that large. Furthermore, the population growth was almost exclusively due to migration, which is heavily concentrated in younger age groups, which won’t be expected to experience many deaths, relatively speaking.

A Note on the Graph

The graph below is from the Office of National Statistics methodology document. 

Note that in 2022 and 2023 the biggest cause of differences between the two models is simply given as “Other changes”. This is vague – a description like “Other changes” can hide a lot. After all, the “Other Changes” are precisely what most people are wondering about.

What are these "Other changes"?

  • Long term effects of Covid itself?

  • Long term effects of Covid measures such as lock-downs?

  • Long term effects of Covid vaccines?

The new model seems to be better at obscuring than revealing. Good sciences should be the other way around.

Tuesday 27 February 2024

AI Generated Images Lack Historical Accuracy (Battle of Britain example)

AI Generated Images Lack Historical Accuracy (Battle of Britain example)

Recently, during a Quora discussion of the Battle of Britain (air war, early 1940s), a AI generated illustration of a scene from that encounter was used, as shown below (the photo was supposed to show a squadron of Hurricane fighters climbing to meet the enemy, I believe).

A Quora user asked the original poster (who used this image for the post) the question below.

Question: Why would you use AI to draw something that doesn't even vaguely resemble a hurricane?


A Respondent Agreed: Yes. Those images fail to resemble anything that ever flew in WW2. Irritating.

My (hopefully) helpful response to this AI related issue:

AI just recognizes words in the prompt (actually, it just operates on statistical correlations among character strings), then makes up a picture based on images associated with those words. So, it may have ‘read’ “Battle of Britain”, then composed a picture of a plane that was associated with that phrase and others. Those images could have been Spitfires, 109s, Hurricanes, 110s, or almost any WW2 plane, really. Then it creates a sort of collage image, based on that (i.e. from bits and pieces of those other images).

I put together a series of photos, mostly taken from actual pictures take during the war, to further explain this.


As you can see, the AI picture looks quite a bit like a WW2 fighter of the era, but not exactly like any of the aircraft that actually participated in the battle.

  • It is somewhat like the German BF 109. but the nose is too fat and it is lacking a strut connecting the wing at the tail to the fuselage. Plus, there is a big air scoop on the bottom of the fuselage, which the actual plane didn’t have, as is clear in the inset photo of the 109.

  • Clearly it is not supposed to be a BF 110 (not shown), as that was a twin-engine plane.

  • Similar remarks apply to the comparison of the AI plane and the British Hurricane (which has no weird scoop under the nose, which is also much sleeker than the AI plane.

  • And the AI planes look nothing like a British Spitfire, for the same reasons, as well as the different cover over the cockpit. Though the AI wings is mostly in profile, I think it is clear that these do not have the classic elliptical wings of the Spitfire.

So, it seems that the AI just created a fighter from bits and pieces of images of other planes. Which might not matter much in this case, but there are times that you really need accuracy, and you just can’t rely on using an image that an AI concocts, from bits and pieces.  It can make you look sloppy (using an inappropriate image to go along with what you write) and might even have legal consequences (copyright, libel, etc.).

The text that the AI produces has a similar problem. It also gets pieces from here and there in its corpus, based on a statistical “next word” algorithm. But there is no understanding going on inside the AI, so you simply can’t trust the result.  It might say anything, so you have to check it for yourself. In the famous words of Gorbachev, “trust but verify”. However, if you have to verify everything that a source tells you, it's not a very useful source.

On top of that, the algorithms might have peculiar ‘guardrails’ put in by the programmers, that can have unexpected results. For example, in this case there could be guardrails programmed into the AI about showing high technology associated with Hitler’s regime, for fear that people will say “oh cool, Nazi planes were great, we need a Nazi party too”. So, in order to protect people from this supposed risk, the AI might give you a picture of a German plane with British or American markings.

I expanded one of the AI generated planes to show this. There are vague markings on the craft, but it wasn’t clear what nation’s Air Force they were meant to represent. As you can see, the best that I could get out f the highly pixelated image, was a sort of “S” shape. 

 

As you can see from the war-time photos of actual plane, the combatants weren’t shy about marking their aircraft. In fact, the national symbols (the British roundel and the German cross) were very evident. That was partly a result of the Geneva Convention, and also to avoid accidentally shooting down your own planes.So, it is interesting that the AI seemed to avoid using real markings, when the participants were definitely using very large and obvious markings.

Needless to say, this example is especially interesting in light of other recent complaints about the lack of historical accuracy in AI image generation.  It is concerning that, over time, AI could rewrite history, and we might not even be aware of it.  This is why we should never take anything written or drawn by AI seriously. It doesn’t really understand anything and on top of that, humans have also interjected their cultural preferences (“AI alignment”), which can have bizarre unintended consequences.

Or maybe these consequences are intended. Who knows, AI generative models are black boxes, built by corporations that have their own agendas and interests.

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And, since I have my own interests, I might as well plug a related book. :)

The Sappers' War: 12th Field Company Royal Canadian Engineers, Oct 1943 to Sept 1945

What follows is a review of the history of the 12th Field Company, Royal Canadian Engineers, primarily relating to the time that the company was in the Italian and Northwestern European theatres during World War II. Though the book focuses on the experiences of a particular company of Canadian military engineers, it also discusses some of the wider issues of the second world war and how it affected the people who lived through the era, civilian and military. Among those are my father (a sapper or military engineer) and mother (a war worker in wartime Britain and ultimately a war bride).

Thus, this is meant to be an informal and unofficial history of the company, written by an interested party in an effort to understand what these men went through during this period, and how that experience affected them and other people who lived through the war. The military aspects of the company's history are there (e.g. fighting, building bridges, detecting mines, maintaining routes), as are the cultural factors that influenced them and their times (e.g. the movies that they watched, the drinking they did, the many diseases they faced, their interactions with the Italian, British and other civilians that they lived among, their worries for the future). Some focus on life on the British home front is also given, via the experiences of my mother and her family.

Since many people had family and relations that lived during this time, it is my hope that the account will be of general interest to them, and to any that have a particular interest in this critical interval in history. Also, though the text relates specifically to Canadian sappers, I believe that many of the experiences will be common to the soldiers and loved ones of other nations who lived through the war, especially Americans and those from Britain and the British Commonwealth.

The primary sources of this document are the 12th Field Company War Diaries and related orders, with some material from The History of the Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers, Volume 2 as well as various official histories by the Department of National Defence. Various other published sources are used as well, especially when discussing the wider issues of the war or the army experience (e.g. Churchill’s history of the war) , or conversely when relating very specific episodes of the war (e.g. Popski’s Private Army in late 1944). Personal accounts of my father’s or mother’s stories also augment the narrative. I have tried to fit those in during appropriate time periods, though some stories are more general and have therefore don’t necessarily relate to the time period being discussed. Nonetheless, they do help capture the essence of “being there” during the war years.

The War Diary is a day by day account of the primary activities of a given unit, as recorded by personnel in the headquarters staff of that unit, and signed off by the commander of the unit. As such, it is an official record, though the writers often brought a bit of their own character into the document. Naturally, as a relatively brief document it can’t hope to capture the complexity of the individual stories of 280 or so men, so the family lore generally has no corresponding entry in the War Diary, though there are sometimes tantalizing hints and near-verifications of these personal accounts.

There are a number of other sources for the book, from official histories to popular history books. I include quotations and references from these works (an eclectic mix), as I believe that they also shed light on different aspects of this period of time, and besides that, are just interesting accounts, in and of themselves.

U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B09HSXN6Q2




Saturday 10 February 2024

Ranking Reader Feedback (1 to 8) or What Makes a Writer Happy?

 

What Makes a Writer Happy?

(Ranking Reader Feedback, 1 to 9)

My Quora posts just went over 500,000 views recently (Jan 31, 2024). That seems like an accomplishment of sorts, though writing about it feels a bit self-centred (i.e. blowing your own horn). But I don't own a cat or dog, and my son is grown up (waiting on grand-kids, hint, hint, Scott), so funny pet and cute child content is not currently possible. Thus I will brag about this instead.

But in order to make the bragging more palatable, I will write about the various types of feedback that my writing (and my wife’s) have received and give some indication of how they differ. I will rank them, because ranking is fun and people often like that sort of thing. It also helps to frame matters, which helps to develop the content of the essay. So here goes.

Note that this all applies to internet channels for sales and other feedback.

  • 1 – Selling Print Book(s)

I know it is a bit old-fashioned, but there is still something special about selling a print book, via Amazon (or some other on-line business) that is pretty cool. I think it has to do with the idea that someone out there will pay a higher price than you charge for the ebook and that he/she will wait around for your book to arrive in the mail.

On a few occasions, I have had readers get in touch with me, desiring a print copy of an ebook. They might want that because the book will make a nice gift or they might have a collection of books on that subject. My book about military engineers in WW2 fell into that category, as did my book about working one summer on the railroad. In the case of the WW2 book, it turned out that the reader’s uncle was in the same unit (Royal Canadian Engineers, 12 Field Company) as my dad. So, symbolically, it felt a little bit like getting old comrades together.

The fact that someone went to some trouble to get a print copy of your book is flattering and the idea that you are helping some person out in this way is very rewarding.

  • 2 – Selling ebook(s)

This one is great, too. In the Amazon marketplace, we tend to sell a lot more ebooks than print books (about 20 to 1 ratio, I would say). Perhaps that makes it seem a tiny-bit less special than print books, but it still is a great feeling.

There are two possibilities here: the regular ebook and the Kindle Unlimited (KU) read of an ebook.

The latter (KU read) actually lets you see how well your book was received, since you are paid by the page. Most of our books have good completion rates, which is very nice. In some cases, non-completions are understandable. In the case of non-fiction such as a travel book, the reader may have just wanted to get a general sense of a subject or a potential trip, without spending a lot of time on details. With fiction, it may be that it is just not that reader’s thing (i.e. preferred genre or subject matter). Also, for a long novel, such as some of my wife’s, you can make more money than on the royalties for the same book.

In the case of a regular ebook sale, you can be happy with making some money and supplying a reader with an enjoyable few hours (you certainly hope so, anyway).

  • 3 -Running Successful Promotions

Promotions can be giveaways (they can be run for 5 days of every 90 day period) or time-limited price cuts. The former gives you some new readers, as does the latter, along with some money.

If you are lucky, money is not your main reason for writing, so you don’t worry too much about the “missing money”. You are just happy to know someone is (hopefully) enjoying the fruits of your labor. It could well be that the person is on a tight budget, so you feel good about helping out such a person, even in this rather small way. My wife often mentions that.

Every now and again, one of your promotions will go viral. Suddenly you will notice a big uptick in downloads. Over the next few days, that can turn into a flood of downloads, which is rather exciting (e.g. in the 100s, 1000s or more if you are an exceptionally lucky person). You get to see your book on the “Top 100” list for free books, at least in some sub-category. Of course you have to keep your wits about you, and your ego in check. After all, a free promotion is still a free promotion. But it is nice.

There is really no (obvious) rhyme or reason to viral promotions. We have had books go viral, long after they were first published, that have languished up until then. Other times, they have gone viral right away, then languished. Often it isn’t the book that you consider your best writing (stylistically) or your best story (fiction or non-fiction). You think about the cover, or about the title, or about the summary that you wrote for it.

Aha – people like covers that feature water!”

Aha – people like abstract covers with cool fonts!”

Aha – people like short, clever titles!”

Aha – people like long, wordy titles, that telegraph the content of the book!”

Aha – people like short, pithy blurbs and summaries!”

Aha – people like long discursive summaries that explain every chapter!”

But, in reality, these things have a logic all of their own. As a famous Hollywood producer was reported to have said “nobody knows nothing”.

One other thing about promotions worth mentioning, is that they can lead to later sales or later  concurrent KU reads. I have seen this on many occasions. I think of it as a little touch of karma – the universe gives you a small reward for being generous with your books.

  • 4 -Getting Reviews or Reader Ratings

Naturally, every writer likes a nice review or a high rating.

Some people think that most of the reviews are plants or friends, but that isn’t often the case, at least as far as I know. I mean, honestly, who has that many friends? Well, maybe big publishers can get up to these shenanigans, but that’s out-of-scope for most (all?) Indies.

Even a not-so-great review is valuable if it is sincere, and if it is clear that the reader has actually read the book (or at least enough of it to render a valid judgment). For the writer, it can be valuable feedback. For the potential reader, some less-than-stellar reviews will provide reassurance that the reviews are organic and not rigged. And some potential readers may read something like “I don’t like books that feature paranormal events” and think “actually, I love books like that”. You just never know.

Here are a few things that I have learned about reviews and reader ratings:

- you can generally expect one review/rating for every 50 to 100 books sold or downloaded in a promo.  Sometimes more, sometimes less, but this one percentish rule seems to be quite consistent.

- the Goodreads scale and the Amazon scale are a bit different, so bear that in mind when comparing your reviews from these sources.

- writers love to get reviews and reader ratings, so don’t be shy, even if you can’t give a 5-star review in all sincerity.

- a bad review stings for a while, but you get over it.

Social Media

I try to do some blogging or equivalent social media content (as you must know from reading this). It provides an outlet to share ideas, exercise one’s writing muscles and promote one’s “real writing”.

6) Quora

As the beginning of this blog indicates, I post fairly regularly on Quora. This is a social media site run by Google, whereby people ask questions and others answer them. These often tend to be of a somewhat academic nature (informally so), where people can share their knowledge and expertise. Most of my posts are in the area of statistics and data science, since that is my actual profession, or “day job” as writers say, perhaps tongue-in-cheek.

Getting views, comments and upvotes on Quora is a nice lift. It is also nice to think that you are doing some service in the world, by sharing your hard-won knowledge with people who are interested in such things.

In principle, you can make money on Quora, though I doubt that it would amount to much, even with half-a-million views. I don’t mind sharing my knowledge for free. I suspect that’s how most people treat Quora. That said, I might put together some of my best Quora stuff in an ebook at some future time.

It seems like most of the Quora numbers are legit (not bots), though I can’t be sure of that. However, I am suspicious that the big companies (such as Google) are mining Quora for content to feed their voracious Large Language Models (AI like ChatGPT).

7) Blogger

A blogging site gives one a chance to just ramble away on any subject (like I am doing now) and to promote books (like I will do at the end of the blog). Blogger is pretty old now; Substack is more cutting edge. Maybe some day I will try that. But I am used to Blogger, so I suppose that I will stick with it, as long as it’s around.

Like Quora, you can make money posting on Blogger (in theory, i.e. advertising). I suspect that it would be pennies per year, so I don’t see any point in doing so (ok, maybe dimes).

Blogger stats can be rather dubious. I am not sure about recent years, but in the past bots could be a real problem. The 1000 readers that you thought you had last week, might mostly have been the result of an overactive bot or two. Having said all that, it is still nice to see your Blogger views stats go up. You just have to take it with a grain of salt.

Does blogging drive book sales? Maybe marginally, but it is way oversold by social media mavens as a way to sell books (“you must have a blog with rich content, comrade!”). I have occasionally had a blog that had a lot of reads that also ticked up sales of a book that I featured at the end of the blog. But we are talking 1 book for every 1000 blog reads, or ratios like that. So, basically one just blogs for love of writing.

Also like Quora, I suspect the LLMs (large language models) scour blogger and the like for content. So, while you may not be making money for yourself, you might be making money for Google. Hmmmm.

8) Facebook

Facebook is mostly good for family stuff, in my experience. Dogs, cats, children – maybe we should reverse the order.

There are Facebook pages for businesses. We have a Dodecahedron Books Facebook page, but I don’t use it as much as perhaps I should. Unfortunately, in my opinion, the Facebook business page user interface has become such a dog’s breakfast that it is difficult to navigate. Which is too bad, because readers have sometimes contacted me via that route. So, I do try to keep active, at least for their sake, but it is hard.

The regular Facebook user interface is somewhat better than that of the business pages. But, even they have become so plugged-up with “sponsored content” and the like, that it is rather discouraging. But, I check in, when I can, and will try to keep doing so. The fact that you can keep in touch with family, friends and ex-workmates from across the country, is rather charming.

X, formerly known as Twitter

Well, you can blast Twitter posts advertising your books. Maybe they do some good – I’m not sure. If so, the effect is, shall we say, rather limited. But, hope springs eternal.

But X is still good for a laugh, as long as you don’t sink too much time into it, and you don’t take it very seriously.



******************************************************************

As promised above, here are some book plugs:

Kati of Terra Book 1 – Escape from the Drowned Planet

Amazon U.S: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00811WVXO

Amazon U.K.: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00811WVXO

Amazon Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B00811WVXO

Amazon Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B00811WVXO

In saving her small son from alien abductors, a 24-year-old Earth woman, Katie, finds herself abducted instead. She awakens from a drug-induced coma on a spaceship, in a room full of children, both human and alien, and two other women, younger than she is. The young women adapt to the situation as best they can, keeping the youngsters calm and entertained. But, when a drugged alien man wearing a uniform is added to the captive cargo, it becomes clear that this is an intergalactic slave operation.

The slave traders implant their captives with “translation nodes” in order to allow communication among various groups. These are living entities, normally docile, merely enhancing certain brain functions, such as language acquisition. However, Katie discovers that she has accidentally received a very special “granda node”, a long-lived node with its own cantankerous personality, including a fondness for criminality and lethal weaponry. Fortunately for Katie, it also values its freedom. With its help, she escapes on a fringe planet, dragging the peace officer along—also at the granda’s suggestion.

She finds herself on a strange world, with a somewhat deranged personality, quite possibly a killer, in her head, and partnered with a man from an advanced civilization who abhors killing. He is a Federation Peace Officer, captured by the slavers while attempting to bring them to justice. His task is complicated by the fact that he has sworn to avoid the taking of sentient life during the performance of his duties. He can and does, however, make vigorous use of non-lethal weaponry. Since, before leaving the ship, Katie had promised to help her co-captives gain their liberty, she and the alien peace officer find that they have a common cause.

But first they must find their way off the primitive planet and get to the Federated Civilization, avoiding the slavers who have been left on the planet to re-capture them. Their flight is complicated by the fact that the planet has had a global warming catastrophe some centuries back – the locals refer to it as the Drowned World. This has forced the inhabitants to revert to a pre-industrial state of development; however, they are a wily and resourceful people, mostly helpful, but they can also be dangerous.

Kati (to mark her escape, she adopts a slight name change) and Mikal seek a Federation beacon, which had been hidden on this planet ages ago, to aid in situations such as this, (in accord with a longstanding Federation policy for fringe worlds). They must embark on an arduous trek across two continents and an ocean, seeking the temple that holds the beacon. They travel on foot, by cart, by riverboat, by tall sailing ship, and on pack animals, always pursued by the dangerous slavers.

They must rely on their wits, guile, charm and acting abilities to avoid recapture, while their chasers have advanced technology and ruthlessness on their side. Fortunately, they are able to make many friends who help them along the way, and their quest becomes a series of adventures, both frightening and funny, and involving a cast of engaging characters.

To complicate matters, Kati finds herself falling in love with Mikal, the strange, handsome and amusing alien. He seems to be reciprocating, though they both struggle against an untimely romantic entanglement.

Will Kati and Mikal escape from the Drowned Planet? Can they ultimately bring the slavers to justice, as Mikal has sworn to do? Can they free the remaining captives of the slavers, as Kati has promised to do? Read this book and the rest of the series to find out all.

At about 200,000 words (equivalent to a paperback of about 400 pages), the book is an excellent value.



The Sappers' War: 12th Field Company Royal Canadian Engineers, Oct 1943 to Sept 1945



What follows is a review of the history of the 12th Field Company, Royal Canadian Engineers, primarily relating to the time that the company was in the Italian and Northwestern European theatres during World War II. Though the book focuses on the experiences of a particular company of Canadian military engineers, it also discusses some of the wider issues of the second world war and how it affected the people who lived through the era, civilian and military. Among those are my father (a sapper or military engineer) and mother (a war worker in wartime Britain and ultimately a war bride).

Thus, this is meant to be an informal and unofficial history of the company, written by an interested party in an effort to understand what these men went through during this period, and how that experience affected them and other people who lived through the war. The military aspects of the company's history are there (e.g. fighting, building bridges, detecting mines, maintaining routes), as are the cultural factors that influenced them and their times (e.g. the movies that they watched, the drinking they did, the many diseases they faced, their interactions with the Italian, British and other civilians that they lived among, their worries for the future). Some focus on life on the British home front is also given, via the experiences of my mother and her family.

Since many people had family and relations that lived during this time, it is my hope that the account will be of general interest to them, and to any that have a particular interest in this critical interval in history. Also, though the text relates specifically to Canadian sappers, I believe that many of the experiences will be common to the soldiers and loved ones of other nations who lived through the war, especially Americans and those from Britain and the British Commonwealth.

The primary sources of this document are the 12th Field Company War Diaries and related orders, with some material from The History of the Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers, Volume 2 as well as various official histories by the Department of National Defence. Various other published sources are used as well, especially when discussing the wider issues of the war or the army experience (e.g. Churchill’s history of the war) , or conversely when relating very specific episodes of the war (e.g. Popski’s Private Army in late 1944). Personal accounts of my father’s or mother’s stories also augment the narrative. I have tried to fit those in during appropriate time periods, though some stories are more general and have therefore don’t necessarily relate to the time period being discussed. Nonetheless, they do help capture the essence of “being there” during the war years.

The War Diary is a day by day account of the primary activities of a given unit, as recorded by personnel in the headquarters staff of that unit, and signed off by the commander of the unit. As such, it is an official record, though the writers often brought a bit of their own character into the document. Naturally, as a relatively brief document it can’t hope to capture the complexity of the individual stories of 280 or so men, so the family lore generally has no corresponding entry in the War Diary, though there are sometimes tantalizing hints and near-verifications of these personal accounts.

There are a number of other sources for the book, from official histories to popular history books. I include quotations and references from these works (an eclectic mix), as I believe that they also shed light on different aspects of this period of time, and besides that, are just interesting accounts, in and of themselves.


U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

A Summer Working on the Railroad


What follows is an account of a few weeks one long-ago summer, when I was 19 and was working for the Canadian National Railway (CNR) on a railroad construction gang, in the wilds of north-central British Columbia, Canada.

The journal is in the form of a letter, that was never sent. Decades later, I think it has an interesting historical resonance. At times I come off like a callow youth – I plead guilty as charged. I swore a lot more in those days than I do now, but in places the writing is surprisingly good, at least in my humble opinion. And the story has a compelling narrative arc.

There were a lot of interesting and dramatic events that occurred – a number of industrial accidents being the most serious. There were also some colorful characters on the crew, which resulted in some dramatic and at times amusing conflicts and altercations. I perhaps flatter myself by including myself in that number. Or perhaps I condemn myself – I’m not sure.

So, if you want to be reminded of one of those summer jobs that was kind of life-changing, read on. My story may just kick-start some memories of your own.

The memoir/journal is about 9,000 words, a length that can usually be read in an hour or so. It is priced at 99 cents U.S. (equivalent in other currencies) and is free on Kindle Unlimited. Periodically, it will be offered as a free promotion.

U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CN661P8Z

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0CN661P8Z

India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0CN661P8Z

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B0CN661P8Z

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B0CN661P8Z



Three Love Stories


Here are three stories, all dealing with the theme of romantic love. They encompass the feelings we all recognize from our experiences of love: lust and desire, jealousy and betrayal, confusion and certainty, forgiveness and reconciliation, loss and rebirth. They even suggest that love might get a little help from those mysterious realms beyond our normal, everyday life. Love is, after all, one of the most magical of all transformations that we mortals can undergo.

Three Love Stories
Amazon U.S.:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Germany:

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B01BLVSZ2G

Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B01BLVSZ2G


It should be noted that these three stories have been previously published, but we wanted to bundle them together, for a number of reasons.

  • Firstly, they are thematically connected - they all concern the joys, pains and triumphs of romantic love.

  • Secondly, the first two stories are connected by plot and character - Love at the Lake: Part 2 (published separately as “A Mid-Summer Morning’s Dream at the Lake”) tells the story of what happens later to the characters embroiled in the jealousy and betrayal of Love at the Lake: Part 1. Characters can sometimes take on a life of their own, and insist that the writer tell their whole story - that’s just what happened here. Love and Rebirth on the Prairie follows different characters, but they too are searching for love within the complexities of family drama with a history of (possible) betrayal.

  • And finally, this bundling gives us a way to package the stories in a more economical and convenient form for our valued readers - three stories for one low price. In the future, we hope to add even more to this collection of love stories!