E-books, interactivity and my terrorist act at Vulture’s Point
Two engineering mavens from Clarkson and Penn State have been at work dissecting The Solomon Scandals.
They’re helping me bring down an IRS/CIA building put up by a clippy contractor.
I feel a little like bin-Laden or one of his henchmen plotting scenarios. The destruction has to work. I’m endlessly grateful to the professors for their uncovering the mistakes that a nonexpert would make when writing on a subject so complex.
Right now it looks as if we’re headed toward a mix of missing rebars, inferior materials, use of a reinforced concrete raft rather than piles driven down to the rock, a gas explosion and some oil nearby to heat up steel and weaken it. Oh, and there’ll have been lots and lots of rain in the past week—which, in ways I’ll explain in the book would weaken the building further.
The e-book angle
So is there an e-book angle here? You bet. While our interactivity is happening via e-mail, perhaps in the future it can be more elaborate and more public—with a forum where engineering students can comment on the case history we’re creating in effect. That’s what I’m hoping. Someday, in fact, the forum might even be built into the e-book of Scandals—perhaps even a special edition for engineering students.
I’d mention the professors by name here but won’t, without checking (I might even wait until I make sure they’re happy with the results). Meanwhile this is one of a zillion examples of how writers can use the Net to improve the quality of their work. Scandals is done essentially, but thanks to the engineer professors, the collapse details will be far, far more credible to the experts than they would otherwise. What a contrast to the time when I began Scandals and was at the mercy of local library collections and pokey interlibrary loans!
The Wikipedia angle: Yes, I’m using it, but with my new professor friends, I’m making much better use of the facts there (not to mention the ability to check them).
Vulture’s Point: It’s imaginary, just like the building and the contractor. In reality, however, as I recall, quite a fuss was made about the transfer of a number of federal workers to a dismal area in D.C. known as Buzzards Point.
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