John J. Hohn, Author

A contagion rages. Gun sales have been running at all time highs since the Sandy Hook massacre. Apparently, few stop to think about how unlikely it is that they will be caught in a situation where they will need a gun for self defense. Crazed gunmen don’t single out a stranger’s home as a target. No parent could rush to a school or a movie theater in time with a semi-automatic weapon to intervene commando style to save the lives of those under attack. The odds are almost beyond calculating, yet thousands are reacting as if these are likely—almost eminent—scenarios.

People seem to trust that, given the threat, anyone can handle a gun with the efficiency of a psychopathic assassin. They obviously believe that they will react with a murderous calm despite a rush of adrenalin, the awareness of another human threatening them, and the need for urgency. Apparently, they see themselves taking deadly aim with a steady hand and dispatching their adversary with clinical precision. Add a high capacity magazine, and aiming isn’t necessary. Just keep firing until the villain is down, but keep an eye out for grandma’s china.

Giving Even One Child Better Odds of Surviving . . .

My contention all along has been that high-capacity magazines and military style assault weapons should be banned. Further, I believe that background checks must be extended to include sales at gun shows and other fair style markets. If only one child’s life is saved by enacting this legislation, it is worth it. No other argument makes sense. What the NRA is saying is that these massacres cannot be prevented. They oppose any steps to limit the efficiency of the killer. The NRA is effectively saying that they don’t care if a few children and other innocents lose their lives because the freedom to own any kind of gun and to carry it anywhere is more important.

When I first moved to North Carolina in 1978, I was amazed to see people flock to the stores whenever a snow storm was forecast and stock up on milk, bread and other staples for fear of being forced to go without. They acted as if they expected to be isolated by bad weather for days on end. Their rush to fill the fridge and pantry was fueled by dread—that they will be cut off from their food and water supplies for an intolerable length of time and be gravely inconvenienced; perhaps even suffer death because of these deprivations. Something from the DNA of the early pioneers must be firing off the synapses that motivate modern man to react as if hunkered down in a log cabin miles from the nearest neighbor, low on fire wood and butchering the family pet to survive. That is how dread works in a relatively harmless way. When it comes to guns, however, the subject turns quite deadly.

The Power of Dread . . .

Fear, one author wrote, is rational, reality based and quantifiable. An angry dog charging a person gives rise to fear. Dread on the other hand is not reality based. Its power comes from the fact that it cannot be quantified. Thus a person can so dread an encounter with an angry dog that leaving the house at all is unthinkable. Dread doesn’t yield to any analysis or statistical probability. It persists even when reasonable measures are taken to prevent the dreaded threat from occurring. Dread has taken over when it comes to guns today.  Having a loaded gun in the closet may reduce the level of dread by creating a false sense of security for the owner. The odds that an innocent party will fall victim to the gun are, however,  far greater than the probability that it will ever be used against an intruder. The owner’s household, in other words, is less safe than it would be with no gun on the premises.

People are stripping the retailers’ shelves buying more ammunition. The odds fall in the million-to-one range against a gun owner ever being in a life-threatening situation that would require the use of a firearm. Taken further, the odds of succeeding in such an encounter drop off exponentially when the owner is not likely to possess the calm presence of mind to use the weapon effectively. The money paid out buying ammunition is being spent to fend off a dread. The stockpiling leads people to believe that they are taking responsible action when they are not. Putting more guns into the hands of frightened, untrained owners doesn’t lessen the likelihood of violence. It practically assures that more people will be hurt or killed. A household alarm system would make a much better investment.

Reshaping the Debate . . .

Arguments that cannot be supported by logic and reasoning usually rely on inflated rhetoric and sophistry to make their case. Whenever we allow opponents to define the issue of debate, we have dramatically reduced our chances of succeeding in pleading our case. For example, Rand Paul recently could not attack the reasonableness of extending background checks and banning high capacity magazines, so he trumpeted that the Second Amendment was under attack. Nobody wants freedoms abridged. But they are all of the time. Freedom of speech does not protect the right to slander another or incite a panic in a crowd. Rand Paul knows that there are laws already on the books that prohibit the sale of certain firearms. At the time that they were passed they did not represent a threat against the Second Amendment nor do they today. They represent thoughtful legislation enacted in the interest of public safety. Paul is simply trying to redefine the debate to switch the focus. He isn’t interested in protecting the Second Amendment. He is making sure his campaign receives a substantial contribution and the backing from the NRA.

The Second Amendment is predicated on an important qualifier, which reads:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

This relatively simple statement has been interpreted by others more qualified than this writer, but the NRA finds it convenient to dismiss the phrase: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, . . . while at the same time, emphasizing , the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. Yet all of the clauses in the wording of the amendment deserve equal weight. A militia can be presumed to be more than one person. It is the right of the people that is not to be infringed. Neither clause asserts unambiguously that any one person shall have the right to own any weapon and carry it anywhere desired.

In addition, the right to bear arms has been infringed. Laws against automatic weapons, sawed-off shotguns and other more lethal firearms have been passed. They are on the books. They are being enforced. They constitute a precedent for further legislation. Any argument claiming that the Second Amendment is being weakened is disingenuous and obfuscating, and Rand should be rebuked for saying as much. He knows better.  Community safety is the issue, not the sanctity of the Second Amendment. Reasonable people act in a reasonable manner whenever the good of the community is at stake.

When Dishonesty Doesn’t Work, Perhaps Patriotism Will . ..

The NRA protests that laws currently on the books are not being enforced. Passing additional legislation, they claim, does not make sense because it will not be enforced either. Actually, most of the laws on the books are being enforced. Class III weapons require registration and a special license. Some states require gun registration and enforce it. It  would surprise nobody to find that laws are not enforced in those jurisdictions where the NRA has promoted and funded a candidates who—wink, wink, nod, nod—back away from enforcing gun control laws for fear of losing NRA endorsement.

If the NRA is concerned about public safety and they know of areas in which gun regulations are not being enforced, then it is their patriotic duty to report those conditions to the authorities. The NRA wraps itself up in the flag, wears patriotism on their sleeve, but when it comes to acting like a responsible citizen, they slink away. Or are they just blowing smoke. They know that current laws are enforced. They use this false claim in their protests against new legislation. They are shifting the focus of the debate. If they telling the truth, if they know of laws that are not being enforced and are doing nothing about it,  they stand on the threshold of anarchy. Any citizen looking the other way when laws are not being enforced fails the community. Imagine looking away if the laws against burglary are not being enforced. Inaction condones the crime. Gun laws are no different. Any reasonable, responsible organization would insist that laws be enforced.

There are no laws currently on the books requiring background checks for sales at gun shows or banning high capacity magazines. This legislation needs to be passed, signed into law and vigorously enforced. It will not stop gun violence. It will not stop the killing. We have far too many guns circulating in the public domain to make that a realistic wish. But we can take steps to make sure guns do not fall into the wrong hands by extending background checks and limiting the efficiency of an attacker by denying them use of a high capacity magazine. We must do something to improve the odds for our children.

I welcome your comments. Please enter them below. Also, I invite you to check out the other pages of my web site. Thanks for looking in.

Here, never to be forgotten, is the list of the Senators who preferred to keep favor with the NRA rather than take one small step to protect our children. Listed below are the Senators who voted against extending background checks to include gun shows and other improvised markets.

1.            Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN)
2.            Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH)
3.            Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY)
4.            Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT)
5.            Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK)
6.            Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO)
7.            Sen. John Boozman (R-AR)
8.            Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC)
9.            Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)
10.          Sen. Dan Coats (R-IN)
11.          Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK)
12.          Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS)
13.          Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN)
14.          Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX)
15.          Sen. Michael Crapo (R-ID)
16.          Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)
17.          Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY)
18.          Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE)
19.          Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ)
20.          Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC)
21.          Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA)
22.          Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT)
23.          Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND)
24.          Sen. Dean Heller (R-NV)
25.          Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND)
26.          Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK)
27.          Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA)
28.          Sen. Mike Johanns (R-NE)
29.          Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI)
30.          Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT)
31.          Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
32.          Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS)
33.          Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)
34.          Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)
35.          Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH)
36.          Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR)
37.          Sen. James Risch (R-ID)
38.          Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS)
39.          Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)
40.          Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC)
41.          Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL)
42.          Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL)
43.          Sen. John Thune (R-SD)
44.          Sen. David Vitter (R-LA)
45.          Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS)

The NRA claims that background checks will not prevent another Sandy Hook. The real issue is whether extending background checks could potentially prevent one lunatic from acquiring a rapid fire* assault weapon. Doing so might save a child’s life. The horror is that a Sandy Hook is likely to happen again. There are too many guns unaccounted for among our citizens, thanks in no small part to the hysteria promoted by the NRA over the years on behalf of the gun manufacturers. But if one background check prevented one crazy gunman from killing one child, then it would be worth it.

People Use Guns to Kill People . . .

John J Hohn and his dog Jessie

NRA members are quick to cite the fatuous and insulting argument that “Guns don’t kill people, people do.” Yes, people kill people. People use guns kill other people. That’s the point. The truth is that if rapid fire semi-automatic assault rifles* stay on the market, the people who want to kill other people will be equipped to do so more efficiently.  Put a killer in a school with an semi-automatic assault weapon with a high capacity magazine  and more children will die. It’s that simple.

High capacity magazines assault rifles are not necessary for the defense of one’s home. At Sandy Hook, twenty-two children were murdered. Four teachers were  killed–deaths numbering much higher than ever reported as having attacked a home. Protecting a home does not require that much  firepower,  yet the fear is hyped by the NRA and ordinary suspend good judgement and actually believe it.

The NRA discounts the call to pass rational gun control legislation by labeling it an emotional reaction to the recent tragedies. Of course it is. Kids were slaughtered at school. Teachers were murdered. Families grieved. Lives were changed permanently. If that doesn’t get an emotional response then we are in very serious trouble. The real shame is that we did not get an emotional response from our Senate who should have done everything possible to prevent another tragedy of such horrible proportions. 

Senators, Republicans for the most part, have shown more emotion of Benghazi than Sandy Hook. Members of the diplomatic corps know the risks of their profession. Children going to class should not be at risk at all.

NRA Unabashed in Hyping Fear . . . 

The NRA is unabashed in its use of emotion to hype the irrational fear that guns might one day be confiscated if gun regulations ever get on the books. They are playing the paranoia card with their membership. Several states have required registration of firearms for years, and none ever moved to confiscate firearms. The NRA wraps their intentions in the flag and invoke patriotic sentiment and emotion, repeatedly citing the Second Amendment. The argument for sane gun controls is not about either. The argument is for reasonable regulation of lethal weaponry. What could be more patriotic than making ever effort to guard the nation’s future by protecting our children and the innocent as they move about in our communities.

The NRA has the gets its lackeys, like those listed above, to defeat any legislation remotely connected with firearms. It is a given that they would defeat any bill introduced to confiscate all the guns in private hands. Even non-NRA members would be opposed, including this writer. Using fear of confiscation is an obfuscating premise cited in opposition to legislation introduced to bring some level of rational control over the use and sale of firearms.  Registration does not lead to confiscation.

For decades, hunters have been required by states to buy a license before taking to the field. Hunters own guns. Buying a license is tantamount to registering a gun. Yet nowhere in the history of the country has the requirement to secure a hunting license led to the confiscations of hunters’ guns.

Protection for Ducks, Yes; Our Children, No . . .

Further, for years, hunters have been required by law to modify the magazine capacity of their guns depending on the game being hunted. Waterfowl hunters, for example, must plug their magazines so that no more than two cartridges can be held at any one time. With a round in the firing chamber, in the interest of protecting wildlife, hunters can only take three shots before stopping to reload. Yet the NRA opposes legislation that will limit the size of magazines on semi-automatic weapons. A gunman in a school yard can fire as many shots as can be held in the largest magazine available. Duck hunters are limited to three shots. A maniac has no limit and can fire 30 rounds into a crowd of kids in a few seconds.

Bottom line for the NRA is not freedom. They may want the country to think so, but the bottom line for them is power. It is not the protection of our homes and families, but the protection of the arms industry to sell whatever they can and make money. The police of the nation have raised a voice against high capacity semi-automatic weapons, but the NRA will not respond. The NRA, however, will praise first-responders for what they do and at the same time back policies that make their work more hazardous. This isn’t patriotism at all. This is the irresponsibility of sociopaths–the same limited humanity and absence of conscience as displayed by people who wade a movie theater or school playground with the most lethal weapons available and open fire. No wonder the NRA understands its market so well.

Boyhood home of the author in Yankton, SD, had a firing range in the basement.

I grew up with guns. Hunting pheasant and waterfowl with my dad when I was a boy are among my fondest memories. He cut down the stock of a Remington 20 gauge pump for me before I reached the age of 10. We had a firing range in the basement of our home. The backstop was heavy timber with a steel backing and cotton batten to prevent ricochet. At ages 8 and 10, unsupervised, my brother and I shoot away an afternoon with a Remington pump 22 rifle, my Benjamin air rifle, or a High Standard 22 automatic pistol. Mother tolerated the racket at all hours. I became good enough with the pistol to hit a coke bottle tossed into the air as a target. Dad and I would put on a show for a hunting party by knocking down clay pigeons tossed aloft by a member of the group.  Dad would take the first shot. I would bust the biggest piece remaining in flight after he first busted the target to pieces.

I don’t know everything about guns. I am not against guns. I am for the sane regulation of guns. I don’t believe in putting formula 1 race cars on our streets and highways and suspending the speed limit so that the drivers can go as fast as they want wherever they want. For the same reason, I am opposed to allowing ordinary citizens to take high capacity rapid firearms into any part of our country that they want and do whatever they please with them. This is not freedom. This is subtle support of tyranny by placing the tools of terror in the hands of the ignorant, the deranged and the psychopathic;  supporting the rights of a few against the safety of all.

The NRA may lace their rhetoric with appeals to constitutional freedoms, but they enable terrorists.

Logic and Compassion Will Not Prevail . . .

Logic will not prevail against people like those who run and ardently support the NRA any more than it would have prevailed against committed members of the Nazi party leading up to and during the early years of World War II. They can only be turned back when our elected officials see the greater risk lies in supporting the NRA and the chances of staying in office greatly enhanced by listening to the will of the people. The American public needs to bring pressure to bear. We must define the issues as ours rather than let the NRA define them as theirs. The fight needs to be our own turf,  not theirs.  Stay active. Stay alert. Be unrelenting. You may save a child’s life, maybe one you know and hold dear.

*Rate of fire varies. Semi-automatic weapons fire a round every time the trigger is pulled and automatically eject the spent cartridge and replace it with a live round. With other guns, the spent cartridge must be ejected from the firing chamber and replaced with a live round manually by the shooter–usually by a pumping a slide mounted under the barrel of the weapon, a lever directly behind the trigger, a bolt slide on that opens the firing chamber, or, in the case of single action revolvers, cocking the firing hammer. The rate of fire is much slower with weapons requiring manual operation to eject/reload.

Authors Note: Please feel free to comment in the area below. Also, I invite you to look through the other pages of my web site. Thanks for checking it out.

John J. Hohn, Author

Anybody with the bucks can publish a book. It’s no longer a big deal, although an author can tap into an allotted fifteen minutes of fame basking in the praise of family and friends—hardly the most objective critics. There’s a misnomer at work. Self-publishing or publishing-on-demand only means printing. Bringing a book to market should be called self-marketing because that is what it is all about. Traditional publishers don’t just print books, they market them—something few outside the industry ever take into account. Thus, the huge surprise reported by first time self-published authors. They need to market their work if they want sales and recognition.

Books, even great ones, do not sell themselves. Making matters infinitely worse, of course, is that most writers are not attracted to nor interested in jobs in marketing and sales. Many even nurture at least a mild disdain for that kind of work, if not a passionate dislike for it and everyone so employed.

A First Mistake . . .

Traditional publishers know the ground on which the battle for readers is fought. They have the networks, the contacts, the reviewers, and the wholesale buyers all lined up for their next offering. The self-published neophyte enters the field virtually unarmed and with no knowledge of strategy or tactics as they presume to contend against the well equipped veteran forces of the industry. The freshman author’s first mistake is to regard traditional publishers as adversaries. They are not.

The real adversaries are the new author’s would be friends—the legions of printers, publicists, contest promoters, etc. 99 percent of self-published authors don’t make money. They lose it. But those would be friends, those who work in the industry promoting a granfalloon of fraternity, mutual support and mentoring, do. They make the money.

A combination of vivid imagination, discipline in postponing gratification, and ignorance make the inexperienced authors fair game for those who are in the business for the buck. They can rely on an author to be patient for results. After all, it took months to write a book. They can count on the author to envision the ultimate goal of recognition, praise, and financial reward. Working with the stuff of dreams is an author’s stock and trade. And ignorance, well, ignorance can hold its own by remaining silent on its own behalf. Being impaled on one’s strengths is a horrible way to lose.

A Little Self-Assessment . . .

A first step in fending off the seductive pitches of the predators prowling the industry is an honest, brutal self-assessment. Some questions cannot be ignored:

• Can I sell? Have I ever sold anything? Successfully? Will I enjoy selling?
• How will I attract buyers to my book?
• How many books can I reasonably expect to sell?
• What is the market for my book? How do I enter that market?
• How much time am I willing to spend each week promoting my book?
• How many new books are published each year? How many in the same genre as my book?

If an author answers, “No,” or “I don’t know,” to most of the above, then the first logical step is to back fill with research and study. Rather than do that, however, most first-time authors delegate those tasks to someone who seems to know and pay them to take on the job. Those vying for the role are legion. They are printers, marketers and sales organizations, surprise—surprise, who know how to sell their services to aspiring writers.

Marketing and selling are fields worthy of study. It behooves an author to know something about both, if for no other reason than to appraise the offers of service from the firms in the industry.

The dynamics of the communication between buyer and seller break down in three continua based upon the buyer’s needs or motivation. Thus, a continuum anchored on one end would classify a need as urgent. (300 miles to go and the gas gauge is on “empty.”) The opposite end would be anchored by a need classified as not urgent. (Want a Blu-ray player to replace the old working DVD player.)

Further, buyers are not always aware of their needs. Thus a continuum would be anchored on one end with the need defined as apparent. (No beer in the fridge.) The opposite end is anchored as unapparent. (The water heater about to give out and flood the family room.) When a need is apparent, prospects usually rely on their own resources. They look to be attracted to the source that offers satisfaction. When the need is not apparent, prospects need to be approached and interaction usually must be initiated by a salesperson.

Neither an Apparent nor Urgent Need . . .

A book, unless it is required for school, work, or mastering a skill, rarely qualifies as urgently needed.  A book, further, is rarely regarded as an apparent need. Products for which the need is neither apparent nor urgent depend almost entirely upon direct interaction with a salesperson. Sales increase when a sales force is well trained in the psychology and art of selling and knowledgeable about products they represent.

Authors usually are not trained in sales techniques, but it doesn’t matter because they rarely interact with prospects. They may meet the buying public at a book signing event, during the speaking engagement, or attending a book fair, but their appearances even then tend to be more passive and managed by others.

The choice between approach or attract is also made for the author given that the product is a book. Certainly, authors can approach prospects one at a time, but generating a large volume of sales doing so is bound to fail. One major company in the United States has sold door-to-door for decades but their product is The Bible, and their sales force, hundreds of college students on summer break. Writers are a force of one and cannot generate the numbers in a sales plan that relies on approaching prospects.* Thus,writers are denied the approaches to selling that are most effective in engaging the buyer whose need is neither apparent nor urgent. There only option is marketing.

Marketing, in contrast to sales, is passive. Marketing attracts buyers. Working alone, ignorant of marketing strategy, writers push ahead by trial and error, or perhaps far worse, they are taken in by publicists who promise an array of approaches such as blog tours, Facebook optimization, Amazon reviews, blog consulting, Twitter campaigns—the list expands almost weekly. All of these promotions are passive. None can guarantee sales. All they can guarantee is that they will do as they promise. The writer will be required to put in hours of time sustaining the campaigns once initiated, so much so that most will find that their lives have changed, that they no longer write as much as they once did, and that making the top 100 at The Times remains as much a pipe dream as it ever.

Supply-and-demand is yet another principal of marketing and sales that writers may at least recognize. When it comes to books—ordinary, entertaining, well-written books—the supply overwhelms demand. First time authors are urged to offer eBook versions of their work at no charge—give it away. They may be asked to make a number of volumes available to a web site for readers who may, or may not, publish a review of it. If it’s free, maybe someone will pick it out of the torrent. The next Willa Cather, or Eudora Welty, or F. Scott Fitzgerald may be out in the flood with all of the other works being released each month. Often respected reviewers cannot get to them, rescue them and take them to higher ground.

Writers as Consumers . . .

Writers need to realize that they are the consumers for the self-publishing industry—not the reading public. Most traditional publishers know that very few books they bring to market will be profitable. They know the odds. They have the resources that improve their chances. Writers don’t. Writers cannot afford unsuccessful campaigns costing hundreds if not thousands. They would be better off betting at the track. The motivation to enhance the perception that the odds are in favor of the writer is all on the side of the promoters and marketers of the industry. They may see the writer as a client, perhaps even as a friend, but above all, they see the writer as a source of income for their firms.

There are good printing, marketing and publicist firms working in the industry. Choosing one is a topic beyond the scope of this article. To borrow from a popular saying, “When you’re up to your neck in promotions, it’s easy to forget that all you wanted was to write a book.” Writing always comes first with writers. They write for the joy and personal gratification of the process. Theirs is a mission, one in search of their own truth, a search on which they would love to have the company of many. Remaining committed to the mission, however, is often a solitary quest. Stopping to allow the crowd to catch up can be capitulation, the worst of all failures.

* Authors need one-on-one sales skills whenever they wish to approach a center of influence, someone who may represent exposure to a large group of buyers—a subject that falls outside of the scope of this article.

This is the first in a series of articles that I have planned on self-marketing. I invite my readers to watch for subsequent installments and and urge them to thumb through the other pages of my web site. Thanks for dropping in.

My initial article about variable annuities stressed:

• Financial advisers have strong incentives to sell variable annuities as they pay more in commissions than most other investment vehicles.
• Variable annuities offer an array of funds into which the owner can allocate funds based upon the owner’s objectives and risk tolerance.
• Variable annuities offer tax-deferment of capital gains and dividend and interest income, none of which need to be reported until funds are withdrawn from the annuity.
• Contributions to variable annuities are not tax-deductible as with IRA’s, 401(k)’s or 403(b).
• Annuity companies charge an early withdrawal fee during the first several years that an annuity is in place. Funds can be withdrawn, however, prior to the age of 59 ½ without incurring a tax penalty from the IRS.

Financial Adviser John J. Hohn, Retired

Everyone knows that investing entails risk. The stock market goes up and down. The bond market is in and out of favor. Even gold and precious metals can be volatile. Nothing is an absolute sure thing.

Variable annuities, however, assume most of the market risk for the investor by insuring the amount invested for the beneficiaries named in the contract in the event of the owner’s death. Thus, the value of the owner’s estate is not subject to market risk. This is an attractive option for investors who are within a decade or so of retirement when mortality becomes a very serious component in financial planning for a surviving spouse or children.

To illustrate, an investor could fund a variable annuity with $50,000. The contract would insure the initial investment so that, if the value of the investment dropped because of poor market performance to, say, $30,000, the named beneficiary would be paid the initial amount of $50,000 in the event of the owner’s death.

Protecting the Growth

Further, many companies insure the value of a variable annuity beyond the amount of the initial investment. Many contracts stipulate that the company will pay the highest amount achieved on the anniversary of the effective date by the funds in the contract. The original $50,000, in other words, might grow so that on the third anniversary of the contract, the variable annuity is worth $70,000.  If, in the year thereafter, the market collapses, and the stated value of the funds within the annuity drops to $45,000, the beneficiaries named in the contract would receive the $70,000 value level recorded on an anniversary date.

Contracts do not insure the highest level achieved in the market. They insure the highest amount achieved and recorded on an anniversary of the effective date of the variable annuity.

Over the years, additional insurance features have been added to variable annuities and companies are continuing to innovate. Insured income is one such innovation and one that I plan to cover in my next article.

Not a Substitute for Life Insurance

Insurance against market risk is a major advantage of a variable annuity. It is not a substitute for life insurance, but a supplementary protection for the estate of the owner.  Fees for variable annuities are higher because of the life insurance feature. The health and age of the owner is not considered in the application. The insurance component of the fee, therefore, is a flat charge, and it is the same for all owners as the contract is not rated as a life insurance policy would be.

Because variable annuities are long term contracts with early withdrawal fees, they should be considered only when other contingencies have been addressed in a financial plan including an emergency contingency fund, fully funded retirement plans such as an IRA or 401(k). Usually owners are advised not to tap into a variable annuity for retirement income but to hold them in reserve because of their insurance value. The reserve strategy presupposes that other funds will be invested to supplement retirement income from social security and/or pensions. Under most circumstance, a balanced financial plan for retirement would commit no more than 25 per cent of a portfolio to a variable annuity.  Although variable annuities are covered by the Security Investors Protection Corporation (SIPC), it is generally not advisable to invest more than 10 percent or $500,000 in any one variable annuity company.

Considering Only Financial Strong Companies

Prospective buyers should consult Best’s Insurance Guide for the rating of the strength of the company(ies) being considered. Do Not Accept the adviser’s or salesperson’s word. Best’s rating system is very sophisticated and uses language that is calculated not to offend the companies being rated. That said, the description that Best’s give whereas  further study often reveals that they are not a good choice. Final selection of a company should be from top two or three tiers of the Best system.  The hierarchy of the rating system is explained on the internet and in Best’s published annual volumes, the latter being available at most public libraries.

Variable annuities are a very valuable retirement and estate planning investment. The designation of  primary and secondary beneficiaries facilitates immediate payout of the proceeds of the contract upon the death of the owner, unlike the rest of an estate which can be delayed by probate or actions on behalf of heirs in protest against a will or revocable trust. Care needs to be taken in selecting a contract and the company making it available. The purchase is not a casual decision. Any buyer being rushed to a decision should be suspicious of the salesperson’s intentions or the quality of the product being recommended.

Thanks for checking in. I welcome comments below and invite you to look through the pages of my web site. Watch for my next article on variable annuities which ill be posted in a few days.

Financial Adviser John J. Hohn, Retired

Financial advisers have several good reasons for selling variable annuities to their clients. They get paid more for one thing. On most other investments, the higher the amount a client invests the lower commission rate is for the adviser. In mutual funds, this is called a “break point.” An advisor, to illustrate, may get paid 5.00% when a client buys less than $25,000 of shares in a stock mutual fund. If the purchase falls between $25,000 and $49,999, the adviser may get paid 4.50%. Thus at $24,999, the advisor’s commission is $1249.95, but at $25,000, the amount drops to $1125.00. Commission rates vary from company to company and depend largely upon the kind of fund being sold, but the break point pricing is accepted industry wide. If a client ever finds an adviser recommending a slightly lower purchase, a higher commission may be the reason.

For an industry that is capable of some of the most exotic probability computations, it is to be asked why after all these years hasn’t a formula be worked out to replace the anachronistic break point system. The variable annuity industry has solved the problem, but their solution favors the adviser and not the investor. With variable annuities, the commission schedule does not have break points in it. An adviser gets paid the same percentage at $250,000 as at $25,000. Investors need to be aware that the incentives to increase the amount of every sale are there for the adviser.

Variable annuities differ from fixed annuities in that variable annuities allow the investor access to an array of mutual funds, and the money placed in the variable annuity can be spread out or allocated among the funds available in a manner that suits the objectives and risk tolerance of the investor. An aggressive investor, for example, may want 85% or more of the money in the variable annuity directed toward equity or common stock funds. More conservative investors may prefer bond funds instead. Fixed annuities do not provide this kind of flexibility.  Fixed annuities are invested as the annuity company directs. The owner of a fixed annuity usually has little or no say in the investment strategy.

Variable annuities offer the same tax advantages as an IRA or 401(k) in that the growth of the funds in the annuity and the interest and dividend income earned are tax deferred until such time as a withdrawal is made. Then withdrawals are treated as regular income and taxed as income in the year that the withdrawal is made. Unlike an IRA or 401(k), however, no tax penalty is assessed on withdrawals made prior to age 55 ½. Also, it is very important to recognize that payments into a variable annuity cannot be treated as a tax deduction. An investor is advised under most circumstance, therefore, to make a maximum contribution to an IRA or 401(k) before considering the purchase of a variable annuity.

Variable annuities are long term investment vehicles. Companies almost always impose an early withdrawal charge to offset the cost of issuing the contract and the selling costs. Early withdrawal charges are usually on a declining scale and may start as high as 15% and remain in effect for as long as 10 years after the date the contract is issued.  The percentage amount charged and length of time during which the early withdrawal charge is in effect varies from one company to the next. Since most advisers represent more than one company, a client should ask about early withdrawal charges and request a comparison if more than one contract is under consideration.

In my next post, I will discuss the insurance features of variable annuities. Please watch for it. Thank you for looking in on my web site. Please feel free to check out the other pages or leave a comment below.

John J. Hohn, Author

I started this web site nearly two years ago. During that time, I have posted 109 different articles on a variety of subjects. The web site has built up of a following of approximately 450 visits on a rolling 30 day period with nearly 70% of those visiting the site doing so for the first time. My hope in launching the site was that it would attract readers who would also be interested in my novel, Deadly Portfolio: A Killing in Hedge Funds. Sales of my novel have been increasing steadily. I had my best month ever in March, 2013. The problem, however, remains that the number of visits and the volume of sales do not correlate. The web site has failed to generate sales at a rate that justifies continuing it in its present format. I need to evaluate my priorities as a result.

For nearly a year, I have been working on a sequel to Deadly Portfolio: A Killing in Hedge funds. Detective James Raker became a favorite with readers, and he is also featured in the sequel. I am eager to complete it and submit it into my publisher. If I want to reach my goal and get the sequel published, I cannot afford as much time as I have spent over the past two years writing for the web site.

Abandoning the web site is tantamount to turning my back on all the hard work that has gone into creating it and keeping it alive and a going concern. I want to continue writing articles for it, perhaps one a week going forward. The articles will be much shorter in length. Most will be less than 500 words. I will also be posting articles on other web sites with much larger followings in the markets that are give my book better exposure.  Sherrie Wikolaski’s Thriller Ink, for example, generates more traffic to my blog than any other source.  I expect to post an article on a monthly basis on Thriller Ink. Articles will also be posted on other literary sites as well. I will post links to my articles on my web site as well as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn so that those who want to follow my work as they have on my web site will find where my work is being published.

I want to thank all those who have followed my postings and for the many encouraging and supporting remarks that I have received. I hope that none will be disappointed in this change of direction. Maybe shorter articles will be more appealing and attract more followers than the longer pieces. At this point, I simply need to try a different approach and monitor the results. Hopefully, it will be a change for the better for all concerned. I will certainly continue to monitor the results and remain poised to  make future changes whenever they seem necessary. My aim all along has been to become a recognized writer of quality fiction, and I appreciate all of the support that others have given me in my efforts to realize that goal.

Ileen Caron Hohn, 1980. John J. Hohn’s Mother

April 6 is my mother’s birthday. She died in January, 1985 after struggling with breast cancer for several months. I loved my mother. I can’t say that I always understood her. She had difficulty making herself understood to others. I think, in fact, that she had difficulty making herself understood to herself as well.

“Oh, Sonny,” she would start to explain, and then lose the thread to her thought. “That’s just the sort of thing that a person . .  . well . . . a person just . . . knows.” She would laugh until she cried at Donald O’Conner, Danny Kaye, Lou Costello, Gracie Allen and Lucille Ball, especially when they seemed overwhelmed with their plight. In later years it came to me that their humor was a metaphor for her. She must have seen herself in their antics and laughed because of it. When Dad wouldn’t take her to the movies, she took me—on a school night, no less. We saw Mario Lanza in The Student Prince, The Great Caruso, and Because You Are Mine. We saw all of the Francis, the Talking Mule movies and Singing in the Rain every time it came back to town.

She loved Lawrence Welk who was a guest in our home when he first began with WNAX radio in Yankton, SD. She exhorted my sister and my brother and me “ . . . to be somebody” in a way that told us that she didn’t think we were and that she probably didn’t believe she was either.

Ileen Carlon Hohn as a College Student, circa 1921

Mother was proud of her Irish heritage. Dad, of course, was German. Mother would decry during one of her lectures to the three of us, “An Irishman may be drunk. He may be a good for nothing loothy,* but he could make his woman feel loved.” Or later, when she thought we were older, therefore, sympathetic, she delighted in saying, “First there’s me, then Gott, then nobody, then nobody, then maybe you. That’s a German for you.”

Poor Dad. Mother remained a mystery to him. One year, Dad gave mother a 20 gauge shotgun for Christmas. “I got buck fever,” mother said when she came out of the cornfield. A pheasant took flight in front of her in the corn rows that towered over her stout 5 foot, 2 inch frame, and she could not fire the gun. She never tried again. Dad cut the stock down on the gun so that my brother and I could fit it to our shoulders.

We often drove over to Lake Okoboji in Iowa, a distance of about 300 miles, to stay with my Aunt May, mother’s sister, who had a cottage on the lake shore. Dad often stayed home to attend to his dental practice. We loved it when mother drove and Dad was not in the car. The speed slowly picked up on her until she was flying down the highway well over the speed limit.

“My God, how did you get here so fast?” Dad demanded as we pulled into the driveway at the end of one return trip. Mother had called to say we were on our way before we got into the car at the lake.

Mother with the Family. (L to R) Dad, Jim, Mary, Mom and Me. Circa 1948

“I  drove 55 miles an hour all the way, Daddy, except when we were on gravel.” In the 1940’s, it was common to have a stretch of gravel road somewhere on a route of any distance when driving in the Midwest. High speeds on gravel were not safe. The route we followed to Lake Okoboji had about a 35 miles stretch as soon as we crossed into Iowa.

Dad said nothing. He went into the house, sat down at the dining room table, and began writing. “OK,” he announced after a few minutes. “If you drove 55 miles an hour on the paved roads, then the way I figure it, you drove at least 223 miles per hour on the gravel road.”

Mother and I had a special connection. Her intuition was her genius. “That wasn’t careless driving,” she scolded when I scraped the side of the station wagon against the garage door. “That’s something a boy would do when he is thinking about the wrong things.”  I had just broken up with my steady girlfriend and wondered how she knew.

I called her often after I moved away from home. “Hello, Sonny,” she would answer. She had no way of knowing that I was on the other end of the line.

“You’re not here to listen to all the times that it is not you,” Dad would grumble.

Ileen Carlon Hohn, Circa 1928

Some of mother’s mannerisms have become family legend. A takeout restaurant in Yankton featured a specialty they called “Chicken in A Basket.” Mother would order to pick up on the phone, “I want two hens in their pens. No. No. Two . . . ah . . . let see . .two Big ones in a box.  The super dooper. The all in one. After a while, the order takers got to know what mother meant when she called. Now, years after she has passed on, my children tease one another when they cannot remember the name of a featured special at a restaurant by running through the list of malapropisms they remember that Nana favored.

Mother was an avid golfer. She played in two-ball-foursome with Dad at the country club. She placed in a women’s tournament in Irene, SD and was awarded a trophy. It was the only time she won anything and the trophy was still on her dresser when we began clearing out the house after her funeral.

But for all of that, I know my mother loved me. At the time the poem below was written, I was separated from my first wife, and we were headed for divorce. I took my youngest son home for a visit, and I was standing in the living room of our home on Fifth Street in Yankton. “Oh, Sonny, I know how it must hurt,” she said walking up behind me and stroking my shoulder. She couldn’t possibly know, I thought. Then I realized that—yes of course—she knew.

After a time, we are responsible for who we are, but we are not responsible when another does not know how or cannot find a way to love us.

My mother is still with me in the quiet of the house on days when I am alone. I wrote a poem about it.

This Quiet

I thought this quiet in the house
Was part of her–
Something she created,
As she moved from room to room,
Straightening the knitted afghan
On the red frieze davenport
With arms worn thread bare
From my father’s shoes
As he napped for 20 minutes
Each weekday at noon.

Or stooping to pick up a magazine
That had slipped from its casual perch
On the broad arm of the brown easy chair,
And lay spine up on the beige carpet
Like a vacant tent on a dessert floor.

Or paging through the thin gray telephone directory
For the number of the pretty young woman she met
Earlier in the week at the altar society meeting
So that she could just say “Hello.”

I thought it was part of her
But here it is in a place
She can no longer reach
It hovers over the same simple tasks
As the day first slides
Into its morning stride
And the house is empty
Except for me.

Mother, Christmas 1984 with Grandchildren (L – R) Rachel, Joe and Greg.

The last time I saw my mother alive was during Christmas of 1984. She was very ill. She knew that she was dying. My brother and his wife were looking after her, taking care of her affairs, and giving her a bedroom in their home on the nights that were most uncomfortable for her. I was grateful for the time that I could spend with her. She was very alert, and we were able to visit as if she were in perfect health. I wrote the following poem about those last days.

December Parting

Toward the end, she’d clench her teeth so hard
That she rocked them right out of their sockets.
Her big toe on her right foot
Stuck up straight all of the time,
But she stayed alert to every lie
And watched football on TV
With her arms folded tightly around her.

“That’s just the way I sit now,”
She explained, her green eyes warning
Further inquiries were not welcome.

“She never gives anyone a straight answer;
Gives her doctors fits,”
My brother explained.
“She always checks my math
On her checking account—always.

“So, you see what becomes of us,”
She said when the news came back from Ohio
Of her sister’s illness.
“She’s a basket case.”

When I drove her home one night,
We went by the old house.
A Christmas tree glowed in the window,
The years behind those panes—
Neighbors, the war, children growing up.
I thought she’d want to remember.
She recalled old arguments
With the neighbors instead,
Those she felt she’d never won.

In the morning,
She waved good-bye to me
From the window in the kitchen door.
My car idled on the driveway ice
Drowning out the sounds
Of pickup basketball games.
My hands cold as though
I held the mud wet ball,
And I waved back
Then watched her turn
Back toward the dining room
That slept from all the feasts.

Margaret Ileen Carlon Hohn. April 6, 1904 – January 15, 1985. A Wild Irish rose.   A daughter of the prairie. I love you still.  Rest In Peace.

*Loothy Mother’s expression for anyone who is careless about personal hygiene, unambitious, and somewhat untrustworthy.

If you enjoyed this article, I  invite you to comment below. Also, please take a minute or two and investigate the other pages of my web site. Thank you for looking in on it.

John J. Hohn, Author

By Thursday, July 27, 1967, the rioting on the east side of Detroit stopped. The army had taken charge. The same was not true on the west side where the National Guard was deployed. The National Guard was under army command, but the units on duty were still led by their own officers.

Businesses in the downtown area—the banks, insurance companies, brokerage houses, and others—opened for business on Thursday in spite of the continuing turmoil. About 60 percent of our employees reported to work. My department went to work on the huge backlog of work that we knew would result in a deluge of telephone complaints as soon as the agency force returned to work.

The previous day, I had called the supervisor who reported to me and invited her and her mother to come stay with us until the rioting stopped. She lived in the troubled area, but she declined our invitation saying the she felt things were settling down. On Thursday, she and I began calling the employees who had not reported. Most agreed that, barring any increased violence, they would report the following day.

Thursday was also a relatively quiet day in the riot area. Fires were still being set, but National Guardsmen were no longer permitted to carry live ammunition. Preparations were being made for their withdrawal so that city could be put back into the hands of local authorities.

Peace and quiet may have returned to the inner city, but the lives of many were changed by all that had transpired. One of the older women working in my department sounded very frightened when I called her on Friday. She said that she did not want to leave her apartment. A neighbor went out to get her groceries for her. I felt her fear was understandable given her age, but she reported still being afraid on Monday even after a calm weekend. I told her that the company would allow Thursday and Friday as excused absences, but any additional time taken would be recorded as vacation time. I called her every day for a week. Each time she reported that she was afraid to leave her apartment. When her vacation time ran out, I told her that she would not be paid if she did not report for work. I held her job open for two more weeks, expecting that she would eventually be convinced to catch the bus and report in for work.

With a pressing backlog of work, I could not hold her position open indefinitely. I called her and reassured her that others from her neighborhood were making it safely to and from work every day, but she was not persuaded. A month after the violence ended, she was still in the grips of the worst of her fears. She was resigned to losing her job. She would not leave her apartment. I could hear the fear in her voice and nothing I could say made any difference.

My wife and I decided that my somewhat promising career was not worth the sacrifices and perils of living in a major city.. Bullet holes in the glass door of the school that my oldest son attended reminded us that the violence was just a Molotov cocktail away—that all it would take would be another brutal beating by the racist, sadistic Detroit police, and everything would erupt again. We wanted to return to Minneapolis where we were closer to family and friends.

I learned of a job with a Minneapolis hospital and flew back to interview for it. Weeks later, I was notified that my application had been accepted and I resigned from The Travelers. Leaving meant the loss of a number of company benefits. We needed to finance the move ourselves. We would sell the house in Detroit as best we could rather than take advantage of The Travelers’ generous relocation program that relieved an employee of a home if it did not sell within a given period of time. We would not benefit from a relocation allowance, typically a 10% bonus payment, to assist with incidental expenses associated with a move.

The Travelers, thanks to his intercession on my behalf, rejected my resignation and offered to move my family back to Minneapolis where I could resume work with in the office that hired me almost 5 years earlier. We found a home in south Minneapolis and moved in through the snow in February, 1969. Once settled, with the children back in school and the house in order, I realized what the downsides were to the accommodations my employer had made for us. I was placed back in an entry level position. Although I retained my title and my pay level, I occupied the same job that I had when I first came off the training program and assumed upon first reporting in Detroit. It was a setback.

When the Assistant Secretary for the region traveled out  from Hartford for a regular visit, he invited me to have coffee with him. We exchanged small talk for a few minutes, and then he asked, “When will you be ready to transfer again? We can’t afford to keep you in this office in your position for too long.”

What his questions meant, of course, was that I could not expect to stay in Minneapolis for the rest of my career. I did not want my family’s well-being to be subjected to a national transfer program that was essentially a lottery with the names of other big cities in it like Detroit. I did not want to move again–anywhere.  I knew that I needed to resign. Opting out was for me another road less traveled. I didn’t know it then, but there would be many more before I retired.

The last contact I had with the Detroit riots of the summer of 1967 came years later. I was traveling for another company and called on the Frito Lay Company in Dallas where I was introduced to  General Bud Bolling, U. S. Army retired. Bolling commanded the 82nd Airborne and when I told him that I had been in Detroit during the riot year, he very generously shared his experiences.

“We marched right down the middle of the street in formation. Marched into the  school house where the National Guard guys were all hunkered down hiding in the dark. We turned on all the lights, much to their amazement, and challenged anyone to take a shot at us. Nobody did. They hadn’t seen any force behave as we did. Blacks and whites. Taking charge. It was all over inside of 48 hours.

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John J. Hohn, Author

I did not feel that I was taking any particular risk when I drove down to the office on Tuesday morning, July 27, 1967. News coverage continued reporting on the riot throughout the night, but my wife and I started the day with the expectation that order would be shortly restored and the city would return back to normal.

Looking back today at the pictures of the riot area, (pictures)  the destruction and the faces of all those who were caught in the middle of it, I realize that as a young white couple, my wife and I lived a lot more than three miles from the danger and the riot. We lived in a world apart. We knew nothing of life in the city. The 18 months we spent in lily white south Minneapolis was on the fringe of the wealthy neighborhood near Lake Harriet. We could walk two blocks to the beach in our swimsuits and flip-flops with our towels hung around our necks. We never sensed fear.

Furthermore, we never thought for one moment that Detroit would be our home. I had a college degree. I had a career. Detroit was just a stop on the way. The corporate ladder stretched upwards for me, and I was confident that in time I could ascend so that I could make wonderful things happen for my family. We were going to be affluent and comfortable. We would find a city that we wanted to call home—in a safe, affluent neighborhood with good schools and parks. That would be the payoff. I didn’t realize it then, but what separated us from the people caught up in the violence, killing and arson was not so much race or the color of our skins. What separated us was hope. Hope for a better life. We were confident that, regardless of the hardships we might endure along the way, the world would ultimately be ours to shape as we pleased. That would be our reward for persisting, for doing what we were taught—working hard, telling the truth, loving our family, and being kind to others. Even if we failed, we knew the opportunity was ours to pursue.

No Expectations  . . .

Those who were in the riot areas, who watched their businesses, their homes and possessions, and their autos burn through the night, harbored no such expectations. The most responsible members of that inner city community were living in poverty that was generations deep. The schools were separate and inferior to those outside the inner city. Children didn’t venture into the parks because parks belonged to the drug dealers and gangs. Residents feared the police because an encounter with the law might mean a beating.

Some analysts wrote that the riot was an expression of impatience. Things had been getting better, some wrote, and the citizens of the inner city had grown to expect more—more and better jobs, better schools, and better police protection. They—the federal government, the city administration, the state—had failed to deliver the last 10 percent of what people were expecting. Expectations turned to disappointment, disappointment to anger and anger to desperation. That kind of commentary was well received by the whites.

“There, you see?” white neighbors were telling one another in the safety of their own backyards, “You can’t do enough. Those people are burning down black businesses right along with white stores.” In the minds of some, any efforts to improve the lot of the African-Americans in the inner city had been doomed to fail all along. The riots became a serious setback for liberal causes and for the African-American members of the community because the violence gave the bigots so much more to condemn. Analysts did not know of how much had been done or left undone because there was no way on earth that the effort could be measured. Dollars might be counted. Jobs might be posted, but the essentially black inner city living experience was not even close to parity with the white way of life in the better parts of the city.

The 90% that was withheld . . .

My sons Eric and Jim in the front room of our Detroit home.

As members of the white community, we took our freedoms for granted. Upward mobility was a reality. In the 1960’s, we knew that we would be preferred over colored applicants for jobs, that we would be treated courteously by police and that we could attend school conferences and speak up about grievances and have them addressed. Jobs were the issue, of course. Schools were the issue also. But at the core, the white population had no idea of what life as a minority in the inner city was like. Whites had never lived under the same conditions, with the same limitations and deprivations. Few whites ever lived in a society that condoned prejudicial treatment of them. The last ten percent of the dollars may not have been spent, but 90% percent of the compassion, concern, understanding and goodwill had been withheld. The absence of a few more dollars did not cause the riot. The indifference, hostility, prejudice, ignorance and guilt on the part of the white community did. It was the desperation of not being considered as a fellow human that fueled the flames.

“They should leave just the way it is,” white people said. “They burned it. They can live in it.”

I would like to write that my wife and I understood what was going on and the causes of it. We didn’t. Nothing in our experience prepared us for what was happening within ear shot. Standing on my front porch, I could hear the gunfire from 50 caliber machine guns as if war had broken out down town. When reports circulated that snipers were active and people were being picked out indiscriminately as targets, we pulled the shades at the front of the house and kept the lights out so that none of us would be silhouetted at night in the windows.

Newscasters (video time line) announced that President Johnson had ordered troops from the 82^nd and 101^st Airborne into the city, and they were deployed to the east side early Tuesday morning. The west side, where the rioting began on Sunday, was still assigned to the National Guard which was placed under Army command. Bringing more troops into the city caused the rioting, arson and looting to escalate initially.

My Worst Outcome . . .

Telephone service was restored late Tuesday. My manager called to say that we would reopen on Thursday, pending any further serious developments. Anyone who failed to report on Thursday was to be listed as an excused absence. At this time, I was responsible for the department that kept the records for automobile insurance policies issued by The Travelers in southeastern Michigan. The department had fallen behind in the issuance of new policies, renewals, amending existing contracts for changes in coverage and verifying coverage for claims processing. The early 1960’s, after all, had been boom years for Detroit. People were trading cars more frequently than ever. When service fell behind, policy holders and agents complained because nobody was sure coverage was in force and in effect to secure loans and meet licensing requirements. My days were spent on the telephone fielding complaints and intervening whenever possible to resolve problems. I knew that the time lost with the office closed because of the riot would be very difficult to recover. If anything, the volume of claims would certainly increase.

The auto insurance department employed approximately 50 people. In 1966, nothing had been computerized. Handwritten applications for insurance were submitted by the agents, and once accepted by the underwriters, the premium was calculated using manual Monroe hand-cranked calculators, contracts coded and sent to typists for completion. Typist prepared stencils that were then passed on to the mimeograph operator who replicated copies for the policy owner, the agent, and an 8 X 5 card for the company records. The process was painfully slow. At the worst, renewals were being issued more than two months late. New policies could take up to a month to deliver.

The worst outcome of the riot that I faced as young executive was months of more stress trying to respond to a  high volume work flow with less than a full staff to handle it. I still had a good job. I still had a comfortable home. My children were safe. I still had the same future that I had the previous week. Wednesday would be another day away from the office. Eleven people died from gunfire during the day on Tuesday. The Airborne marched in formation down the streets of the east side and took over the school building where the National Guard had established their headquarters in the dark for fear of snipers. The command given was that the lights be turned on, and shortly thereafter the streets on the east side became quiet. Rioting continued, however, on the west side. It would be two more days before the killing and the burning stopped.

To be Continued . . .

Please feel free to comment in the area provided below. Also, I invite you to browse through the pages of my web site and consider the reviews of my novel, Deadly Portfolio: A Killing in Hedge Funds. Thank you.

John J Hohn and his dog Jessie

Phil Kenney’s debut novel Radiance is a passionate family history that spans three generations until it settles on Jimmy and Daisy, mother and son, as the central characters. Kenney, a poet, knows that triumph and tragedy are defined by the context that we set for ourselves. The context can be as narrow as parent and child or lovers caught up in a betrayal. Or the context can be life itself prevailing over annihilation and meaninglessness. In Radiance, Kenney deals with the age old questions of life and death, fulfillment and despair, achievement and failure. He takes enormous risks in his piecing his story together and most often he succeeds—if not triumphs—in the telling of it.

A practicing psychotherapist, Kenney knows that the struggles of any generation are in large part against a legacy of deprivations and indulgences of the generation immediately preceding it, of children against parents.

The story begins with Ruth Brennan, the grandmother who is married to Warren. The couple struggles to raise their three sons in the poverty that gripped turn of the century mid-America. Ruth nearly dies giving birth to her third son, Gerald. Her survival is tantamount to a second birth for her and becomes the emotional base for a precious relationship with her youngest son Gerald.

The story begins as well with Daisy. Author Kenney lets the reader know very early on where his story is heading. The prologue states that

It was Daisy who hid from her friends, from her husband, and, with great success, from herself . . .  .

Kenney has three prominent voices as an author. He speaks only as narrator very seldom, unattached and objective. He speaks as the narrator through his characters more frequently, and his story unfolds in an easy flowing, third-person delivery that is lively and engaging. At times, he speaks in the first person as one of the characters. The Prologue begins with Daisy addressing the reader in the first person. Daisy comments on her own death.

What was left of me, what remained after the passing of every last character, every last imposter and ghostly sprit is what you could a call a soul. No larger than my thumbnail.

Daisy’s monologue from the beyond overflows with forgiveness and compassion for her historical self. Forgiveness, in fact, becomes one of Kenney’s important underlying themes.

Daisy and Gerald marry and they have two sons, Frank and Jimmy. The reader follows this family through the twentieth century as if they were modeled for a diorama. Daisy is beautiful and gracious. Everyone loves Daisy. Gerald is successful but uptight and unavailable. Frank is a star athlete and successful attorney. Their achievements are a given and peripheral to the real struggle in the life of each—to find a degree of personal fulfillment and contentment with self.

All of the characters in the story, except for Jim, fade away as victims of their own dynamics and the banalities of their era—split level homes in suburbia, “Sing Along with Mitch” on Sunday night television, American Bandstand, and Lawrence Welk whose music—utterly devoid of passion or yearning—becomes the iconic expression of a generation seeking to forget the deprivations of the Great Depression and the horror of young men dying in the war. The culture so effectively enables forgetfulness and denial, that

  . . .the collective memory was destroyed with the same brutality and absolute efficiency as the genocide of Native Americans.

Kenney has enormous confidence in his readers. He rejects a chronological history, preferring instead to have events take place as dictated by a hierarchy of the soul; i.e. what is most important in the life. We find, for example, that Daisy may be dead in one chapter and yet alive in a subsequent. Frank may be clinging to life in the hospital only to be energetically engaged in an episode later in the book. One must assume for an author who writes as well as Kenney does that all his choices are deliberate. Given that, I found his changes in voice to be too frequent and often without justification given the weight of the story at the time. Most readers,  however, will not be distracted because Kenney’s vigorous prose carries his story forward so powerfully.

While Daisy is prominent, the story is Jimmy’s, so much so that Jimmy and the narrator become one at times. Kenney’s prose is rich with metaphor and humor. Kenney has created a rhapsody. In doing so he contends with the ancients. His is the story of the modern middle-class American family—a life driven by pursuit of status and comfort, and the eagerness to please. The triumph of modern man is that he succeeded in these endeavors. His failure is that he did so at the cost of his own fulfillment. From the beginning, Jimmy’s spiritual journey is every man’s. Radiance is more than just another contemporary novel. It is penetrating study of the spiritual and psychological health of the culture of America as it became a dominant world power in the twentieth century.

Author’s Note: I compose my posts using Word and transfer to the word-processing program available through my web site manager. I use the spell check facility on both programs. I intentionally use incomplete sentences or fragments as a stylistic choice. I am very grateful for the proofreading and editing skills volunteered by my wife Melinda as a second check against my oversights.  If any errors in the text escaped both of us, please do not hesitate to let me know.