Sometimes the human capacity for ignoring things amazes me. Usually it just disgusts me. Statistics have shown the number of men who never get married has steadily risen over the last half century. This means there are more and more men every year with no wife, mother, girlfriend or whoever to do their shopping for them. Studies have also shown the number of that more men are staying home and raising the family while the woman in the relationship works outside the house. And yet, the grocery stores haven’t really changed too much in the last two and half decades. Nor have the people making the cleaners and the laundry soap or the fixtures responded well. Most men want a cleaner to either not smell or smell like cleaner "Evergreen Forest Glade Heavenly Aroma" dish soap doesn’t appeal to most of the male gender too much. And given that on average men are a bit taller than women, having checkout counters where there are no impulse items at that higher level seems a bit foolish. The floor space is still costing the store the same amount, and wasting three or four feet of shelf space per checkout lane doesn't make dollars or sense.

Something else baffling is the fact that the book matrix hasn't really changed in these stores in nearly forever. There are bright kids books, the same mix of big name writers as every other supermarket and convenience store with a liberal mix of romance novels. But, despite the demographic shifts mentioned above, and the increased number of men who go shopping with their significant female other, the number of books aimed at men, has dropped. When a decade or two back I'd at least see the occasional western, or maybe a war or car themed non fiction book. Sometimes there would be the biography of a famous athlete or president and that's about it. I find it odd that there are less and less independent book stores, and more concentration of business niches that were formerly boutique focused into the larger stores, and yet the publishing industry has been slow to respond. Wal-Mart, whatever there other faults has proven it can sell music at a solid pace and is now the largest music retailer in the country. The book store section in the two or three Wal-Mart's I occasionally visit are no larger than they were when they opened, likewise for Target, Kmart, or any of the supermarket chains.

The question to me becomes, do writers, and editors really care who is selling the books that much? With one of the two largest chains in the country on shaky financial footing, and the steady drop in independent book stores, doesn’t it make sense to better penetrate the non traditional markets? Even if Target never amounts to more than five percent of Pyr or Roc's sales it would be one more market to put books in front of potential buyers. It would also be one more market to leverage Barnes and Noble and Borders into distribution deals that are more favorable to the publisher and writer. Maybe the younger generations of men and women who aren't reading as much could be tempted back into the light.

     With all the stories about dark urban environments, the cold reaches of space, and the heartless politics of arenas from corporate to courtly and criminal to pugilistic, I have to wonder where the bad relationships are? Sure we've got relationships where the two people don't get along. One is a defense attorney, the other is a street cop, that's all well and good and creates emotional weft that we can all appreciate. But what about the battered party in a relationship? The person who arrives at work ready to slay adversaries with briefs, bullets or whate'er the weapon on their field of battle and yet can't stand up to their (in)significant other? I know a few of this type, their the person who'll tell school comities, police, and bad drivers do some anatomically improbable things, and then go home and never raise their voice except to apologize for their imagined faults to the one demon they can't bring themselves to fight.

    Another type we don't see are those involved in relationships that spin on the axis of addiction. In any relationship involving addiction one person is the symptom bearer. Everyone else is somewhere on the continuum of helpful to harmful. Most people being somewhere on the darkside, usually unintentionally. I think in the right hands, a story where someone wears themselves to a nub trying to keep someone they love well supplied with their drug of choice so that person doesn't have to turn tricks or steal for a fix could be interesting.

    Obviously, at least in the context of science fiction and fantasy, these make rather poor things to hang an entire story on, but they do make interesting things to know about one or more of your characters.

• Educational credentials
• Glossary of terms and acronyms.
• Must be referenced. All books submitted with only a list of sources and no foot/end notes or other in text references will be rejected as plagiarism
• Must have as little as possible in the way of references from any of the contributors
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• Desired sales positioning: general non fiction, text book, other.