This is the first volume of the Childers Trilogy: Jan Childers grew up orphaned in the slums of decaying post-diaspora Earth. She was raped, beaten, and starved. Yet she survived. She escaped to become a citizen of the Commonwealth of Free Planets, and joined the Commonwealth Space Force. Over the next twenty years, she turned the CSF into the most powerful and dangerous space fleet that history had ever known. Jan Childers rose to lead that fleet in the Commonwealth's darkest hour, against freedom's most deadly enemy—Earth itself.

The concluding two novels of the Childers Trilogy, in one volume. COLONY WAR The CSF has new technology coming on line, but will it be ready in time to head off the attack by the Outer Colonies that Jan Childers and CSF Intelligence Division see coming? GALACTIC MAIL With the overwhelming new technology of her own design in hand, can Jan Childers rewrite the rules of galactic politics and give humanity a future of peace, prosperity and expansion?. INTERVIEW WITH RICH WEYAND How did you write Absurd Proposals? After Childers, I actually planned two novels, Colony War and Galactic Mail. They were going to be separate volumes, but the story arcs flowed one into the other, and together they were about the same size as Childers - about 90,000 words - so I released them in one volume. That concluded the trilogy. Where did that title come from? One chapter early in Colony War is titled An Absurd Proposal. There is a chapter early in Galactic Mail titled Another Absurd Proposal. Those two proposals, and their implementation, are the plot drivers for the two story arcs. Did it write as fast as Childers? Yes. I don’t outline or plot or write backstory. Once I have the basic direction in mind, I just start writing. It took about five weeks to write Absurd Proposals. I think part of it is that I started writing short stories, and I’m still getting used to the novel format. The result is that I drive the plot along pretty hard. None of the Childers Universe books is a ho-hum read. I’ll say. In Childers, there were eight space battles! Eight space battles and three hand-to-hand combats. In Absurd Proposals, there are thirty space battles, though only thirteen are on scene, plus an assassination. Of whom? Nope. No spoilers. What about your covers? I like people on a cover. No matter the setting or genre, good stories are about people. With Childers, I lucked out. I was looking for a 14-year-old female model with hair a half-inch long and one literally walked into my photographer’s studio. She is the daughter of another SF author, a friend of mine. She absolutely nailed the ten-mile stare I was looking for. For the Absurd Proposals cover, I needed someone who could credibly be the same person twenty years later. The same photographer had a shot in his portfolio of a woman with similar facial structure, eyes, ears, and hair. She’s also a martial arts expert, like Jan Childers, and has that don’t-mess-with-me look. Lucky again. You never mention race or ethnicity of your characters. I seldom describe characters at all. I have a mental image of the characters - I think you have to, to write them - but I prefer to write dialogue and action. The Commonwealth is a multi-ethnic free society which has been interbreeding across racial and ethnic lines for generations. And the names are a clue to that. Alice Chang, for example, or Ashok Gonzalez. Earth names and Outer Colony names are ethnically matching, like Jorge Hernandez or Marc Laurent, because their populations aren’t as mobile. You have a lot of female officers and enlisted in the Commonwealth Space Force. How do you choose the sex of a character? I usually just flip a coin. It doesn’t matter to me, in that context. If I were writing about infantry - you know, space marines or something - that could be harder, because the sexes aren’t the same, no matter what anybody says. I’ve been around 65 years now, and I’ve noticed. But in a space navy context, I don’t think the sex-related differences matter as much as competence and personal qualities. At the same time, once I’ve selected the sex of a character, the differences sometimes drive the character a little differently. A couple of times I went back and changed the sex of a character because it just worked better for the plot. Reviews on the series have been very good. I was hoping for an average above four stars. The actual ratings shocked me. It's very gratifying. So I guess I’ll keep writing!

This is the third book in the Childers Universe. Military genius Jan Childers founded Galactic Mail & Defense to put an end to interstellar war by fielding an overwhelming military force. Funded by the universal provision of mail and freight services, Galactic Mail stood as the protector of all human star systems against interstellar incursions. Childers' one great fear was that Galactic Mail would sooner or later morph into a galactic government that would devolve into tyranny. One hundred and seventy-five years later, her fears are coming true. Galactic Mail has begun to come off the rails, interfering in the internal affairs of planetary governments, coercing them to follow its dictates or face its terrible military might. But what the leadership of Galactic Mail does not know is that Jan Childers put in place a mechanism to pull Galactic Mail back from tyranny. Twenty-four chains of its founders' descendants keep watch over Galactic Mail, ready to intervene if it strays from its charter. Twenty-four Watchers, pitted against the largest organization in human history. But one of them is Patricia Dawson, Jan Childers' seventh great grandchild, and heir to her determination and strength. Dawson will destroy whatever she has to destroy, and kill whomever she has to kill, to pull Galactic Mail back from the descent into tyranny.

This is the fourth book in the Childers Universe. It is the prequel to Childers. THE COLONIES ARE REVOLTING Earth’s oldest colonies are no longer struggling outposts, they are vibrant, productive economies. They have become huge sources of income for Earth’s plutocratic ruling families. But Jablonka Planetary Governor James Allen Westlake VI and his childhood friend, mining magnate Georgy Orlov, see a brighter future down a different path. They recruit two eccentric academics, Gerald Ansen and Mineko Kusunoki, to create a new government for the colonies, that the colonies can split from Earth and seek their own destiny. They know Earth will fight the split. What will they do when the Earth Space Navy comes calling?

JAN CHILDERS IS BACK!Senior Captain William Campbell and Rear Admiral Jan Childers are on the Grand Tour. Eight planets in two years. While Childers' heavy cruiser squadron trains up and drills local CSF forces, Campbell assesses the local intelligence group. Bliss is their fifth stop.They arrive on Bliss just after a hostile incursion occurred at a particularly inopportune time, indicating there may be an espionage ring informing the enemy of the CSF's plans well in advance. Campbell sets out to find and neutralize that espionage ring.They've killed already, and they aren't about to let Bill Campbell put them out of business. But they don't know who and what Bill Campbell really is.For that matter, neither does Jan Childers!INTERVIEW WITH RICH WEYANDSo Jan Childers is back. We thought her story was finished.Well, in its larger scope, the story was finished with the trilogy, in the first two volumes. This is an episode in her life that the trilogy swept past. This entire book fits between the chapters "The Grand Tour" and "Commanding Officer, Task Force 32" of Childers, the first book in the series.Bill Campbell is the primary character?Yes, the action here centers around Bill Campbell, although Jan Childers is also here for much of it and they have some good scenes together. Tien Jessen, Pavel Nimsky, and Sammy Heyerdahl are all here, too, along with a bunch of new characters.What's the primary thrust?We finally find out what Bill Campbell does for a living. All we've really known until now is that he's in the Intelligence Division, and he has a role in counter-espionage, at least after Kodu. He never talks about his work in the trilogy, and Jan doesn't ask. They both have clearances that do not allow them to tell each other everything. They joke about it in the trilogy.This is on the Grand Tour?Yes. After the Feirman payback, Admiral Stepic sends Jan Childers out on a training mission, to bring a lot of Commonwealth planets up to speed on the Fleet Book of Maneuvers. Birken and Durand, afraid Bill Campbell will take half-retirement rather than endure a two-year separation from Jan, send Campbell out to assess the intelligence operations on whatever planets Jan visits.And there's a problem with Bliss.Yes, hence the title. There's a major problem on Bliss. and Campbell is going to 'fix' it. The need to replace the head of intelligence on Bliss after the Grand Tour is mentioned in the trilogy, and that he retires, but no more than that.Did this write as fast as the other books?Not quite. It took 29 days to write once I had the plot elements sorted out in my head. For 48000+ words, that's a little long. But there's a lot of timing issues here, because you have flight times to take into account, and the timing of Jan's planet leave was already set in Childers. I didn't want any discrepancies between the trilogy and this book. I also had to think about how forensic tools, with which I am very familiar, might work in virtual reality. That was cool, but took time.What about the cover?A friend of mine, Matt Shute, posted a selfie on Facebook a couple years back. It was just such a compelling picture. It has its issues, of focus and lighting, but in a night shot, I thought it would work out, especially in a thumbnail version, which is what sells ebooks. Softening the background keeps the foreground more sharply focused than the background. So it's sort of a night-time selfie of Campbell in Joy. The model is a little young for the character, but it worked for me.

IS SOMEONE TRYING TO KILL MARY RAO? Captain Mary Rao, Jablonka's planetary tactical officer, seems to be under the gun from all angles, but neither the Sigurdsen Base military police nor the counter-intelligence investigations personnel believes that it's anything more than a confluence of accidents. Lieutenant William Campbell of the CSF Intelligence Division believes differently. What he doesn't know is who or why. And if he can't figure it out soon, he could die with her.