I have a number of non-fiction books that cover a range of topics, from politics to family history—even a business essay.

The Candy Store Generation: How The Baby Boomers Are Screwing Up America

Baby Boomers are now in charge of the United States. In the presidency, the Congress, the Courts, and in business. How are they doing in their positions of leadership? Not very well, if we look at the debt condition of our nation. They are not living up to the examples set by the generations before them. The nation is sinking under a mountain of public and private debt, and the Boomers in charge seem oblivious to it. They are willing to steal their children’s retirement funds, and their grandchildren’s college funds, to make sure no one in their own generation lives in want or lacks comforts. In this book I look at the leadership the Boomers have given since they became the dominant force in government and business around 2001. Looking at Congress’ response to the 9-11 attacks and their economic aftermath, and at the Panic of 2008, I find the Boomers have done an awful job of moving the USA forward. The Candy Store Generation is available at Amazon and Smashwords, from which it is distributed to other e-reader stores.

Thomas Carlyle’s Edinburgh Encyclopedia Articles

I came across the writings of Victorian writer Thomas Carlyle almost by accident, from following other writers to him. Some of his stuff I found to be dated, mainly his political writings. Some of his later works are downright offensive as he seeks to justify slavery and subjugation of the Black race. But some of his earlier stuff was quite good, and timeless. I started studying him, especially his earlier writings, and found the articles he wrote for the Edinburgh Encyclopedia just at the outset of his career. They were nicely written, simple historical pieces.

Some of those had been gathered into a posthumous volume in the late 1800s, but they had never all been gathered into one volume. I decided to do so, and this is the result. This is not something I anticipate being a commercial success. It’s more of a labor of enjoyment, and a learning experience for me, at being an editor, and at publishing public domain material, including all the formatting and checking that goes with the task. It is available only at Amazon, both as a print book and e-book.

Seth Boynton Cheney: Mystery Man of the West

This is a family history book, about 1/3 narrative, 2/3 family data. Seth Cheney was my wife’s paternal great-grandfather. He left upstate Vermont when he was 16 to go to California in the Gold Rush. The story passed down through the family was that he was a 49er. His family knew only that, and that he arrived in the Texas Panhandle about 30 years later, and moved to Meade County in southwestern Kansas a couple of years later. It was there that he married a much younger woman and raised a family.

Genealogy research has both proved and disproved the story. We find footprints for Seth in California, but not when and where expected. And we find lingering footprints for him in New England, where we didn’t expect him to be.

This is not a book for the general public. It’s listed here, and available as a print-book only at Amazon, so that cousins in the extended family can obtain copies. It might also be of interest to those researching John Cheney of Newbury in Massachusetts Bay Colony, as Seth descended from him. The book has 20 pages of data on John.

STEPHEN CROSS AND ELIZABETH CHENEY OF IPSWICH

This is a family history book, about 1/2 narrative, 1/2 family data. Stephen Cross was a coastal shipper in Massachusetts Bay Colony. He married Elizabeth, daughter of John Cheney, and they lived in Stephen’s native Ipswich Massachusetts. John Cheney was my my wife’s immigrant ancestor and Elizabeth her several-times-great-aunt. As I researched their lives to be part of a book on John Cheney, I found many footprints that they left and decided to expand their story into a stand-alone book.

Again, this is not a book for the general public. It’s listed here, and available as a print-book only at Amazon, so that cousins in the extended family can obtain copies. It might also be of interest to those researching John Cheney of Newbury and Robert Cross of Ipswich, fathers of Elizabeth and Stephen, as the book includes a fair amount about them.

It is available only on Amazon, and only as a print book.

The Learning Curve

This a professional essay I prepared, as part of my work at CEI Engineering Associates, for a noon class. I’ve taught this several times, always to good responses. In this issue, available at Amazon and other venues via Smashwords, I’ve expanded it a little to be more generic, rather than geared to one company.