Dave Nelson

The “Maximum Ride” series from James Patterson is a “Young Adult” series that is intended for grades 7 through 9.

From the James Patterson web site about the first book:
“Max, Fang, Iggy, Nudge, the Gasman, and Angel. Six kids who are pretty normal in most ways—except that they’re 98 percent human, 2 percent bird. They grew up in a lab, living like rats in cages, but now they’re free. Aside, of course, from the fact that they’re prime prey for Erasers – wicked wolflike creatures with a taste for flying humans.”

The defacto leader and namesake of the series is 14-year-old Max. She is the narrator for much of the story and spends a lot of time addressing the reader directly, I find this tedious and it may be what I dislike most about the series.

I struggled through the first book, The Angel Experiment. The writing is far from inspiring and a little condescending, but I found many of the ideas in the story interesting and felt that it could really go somewhere.

In the second book, School’s Out, the writing is a bit better and the flock’s desire for family is touching.

In the third book, Saving the World, the story is getting repetitive. It feels like there are multiple voices writing the book and they have diverging ideas. I like the action but I am growing a bored with the series. But I would like to continue reading and learn the fate of the flock.

I have been buying these books from Fictionwise, the eBook seller now owned by Barnes & Noble and all of the Maximum Ride books have been pulled from their catalog. In a response to an email they have said, “Due to industry changes, our content suppliers are currently unable to offer certain titles from several large publishers. We are working with our content partners to resolve this.” So no more James Patterson for me. I guess I will never know what becomes of the Flock. To the credit of Fictionwise, the James Patterson books I have previously purchased are still available in my library.

To all you book publishers out there, get over yourselves and remember that some money is better than no money.

To the authors out there, I am sorry you feel the need to use publishers that force terrible contracts on you that give away your rights to get your material into the hands of those who want to buy it.

Please do not let this happen to you. If you have the time and stubbornness please push the issue of Photographer’s rights as far as you can.

Trey Ratcliff of Stuck in Customs was harassed recently in Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park trying to take photos of the World of Coca-Cola museum and told that he was not allowed to take photos of the building.

I will be getting in contact with management of the museum and see if I can find out what their policy actually is.

Here is a link to Trey’s blog post: http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/08/09/nearly-getting-arrested-in-downtown-atlanta/

There is a new war being waged, at a time when more people have access to more cameras of all types there is wave a fear, hysteria, and doubt washing over the world. It is only in the last couple of months that this war has come to light, more and more people are being affected by it and getting thier voices heard on TV and the internet.

You can begin reading with this article and video about a New Mexico photographer who is detained by police for trying to do his job. His claim is that the police did not make it clear to him where he could safely work and then attacked him AFTER he left the area.

Then this photographer who regularly visits Coney Island who had an unreasonable mother get the police involved because she believes he may have taken photos of her child.

Bruce Schneier of The Guardian has written a great piece that points out the fact that no known terrorists have photographed thier intended targets.

Union Station in Washington D. C. has become a beacon highlighting the issues at hand, during a video interview with the Chief Spokesperson for Union Station who was in the middle of explaining that photography was indeed allowed in Union Station a security guard interrupts to tell them they cannot photograph there.

As a follow up Joel Lawson has written a posts about “The Union Station Flap” and a follow-up “She’s Serious About Those Hearings” about how Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) is getting involved to ensure that photographers will have the right to take photos in Union Station.

In Seattle it appears that after several incidents something has been done and the police have been given clearer instruction about photographers rights.

I hope that as photographers we can respect the people around us and get the photos we want without upsetting anyone. But we must also stand up to the people that are trying to take away our rights. There is a great document that you can use that outlines your right at Bert P. Krages web site known as “The Photographers Rights.” Keeping a copy of it handy may help answer questions for law enforcement and security guards.

Robert Asprin, Yang the Nauseating, has passed away. I will miss him dearly. The Mythadventures web site has a very nice eulogy and the Everything New Orleans web site has an obituary.

Wikipedia has a nice entry for Robert along with a bibliography of his work.