A letter from Senator Johnny Isaccson

As someone who has contacted my office about veterans' issues in the past, I thought you would appreciate an update on the work I have been doing on behalf of Georgia's veterans as chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs this Congress. I take very seriously the challenges that face our nation's veterans, and as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I stand committed to ensuring responsible oversight of the Department of Veterans' Affairs (VA).

As Chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I am pleased to highlight the bipartisan accomplishments on behalf of our nation's veterans so far this year. Since the start of the 114 th Congress, the Senate has passed the Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention for American Veterans Act (H.R.203) , the Veterans Identification Card Act of 2015 (H.R.91), the VA Budget and Choice Improvement Act (H.R.3236), and two bills to extend authorization for the construction of the Denver VA Medical Center, which have all been signed into law.

We came into this Congress facing serious challenges. With last year's wait time scandal at the VA hospital in Phoenix and the subsequent reforms Congress passed in the Veterans Access, Choice, and Accountability Act , the committee was presented with two very important tasks. First, to make sure that those responsible for misconduct were held accountable, and second, to ensure that the law is implemented properly and is working for our veterans.

It is no secret that the VA needs a lot of work. But as chairman of the committee, I am committed to making sure that we address these issues for our veterans. In order to do this, necessary changes must be made to the VA. The Senate took those first steps by approving the nominations of Dr. David J. Shulkin to be the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Under Secretary for Health and LaVerne H. Council to be Assistant Secretary of Veterans Affairs for Information and Technology.

It is far too often that I pick up the paper and see accounts of another scandal at another VA facility. That is why in April of this year, the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee held a hearing in Colorado to examine the rampant mismanagement and cost overruns of the construction of the new Denver VA Medical Center. I will continue to work to establish a policy of regular visits to the VA headquarters and hosting town hall meeting with VA employees. As a committee, we are working day in and day out to end this culture of corruption and neglect and to bring accountability back to the VA for our nation's veterans.

In addition, the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs has approved both the Veterans' Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2015 (S.1493), to provide a cost-of-living increase for veterans' benefits, as well as the Department of Veterans Affairs Accountability Act of 2015 (S.1082), to expedite removal of delinquent or underperforming VA employees.

My ongoing priority as Chairman will be overseeing the implementation and improvement of the Veterans Choice Program by enabling more veterans to qualify to receive health care in their community. I will continue the oversight hearings the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee has held on the Veterans Choice Act, VA opiod prescription policy, women veterans, and veteran homelessness.

I am proud of the work that our committee and the Senate have been able to accomplish in my first six months as chairman to help our veterans. From passing legislation to help prevent veteran suicide, to holding the VA accountable and bringing oversight directly to the VA, we are working hard to see to it that veterans get the health care and benefits they deserve.

Thank you again for contacting me, and I hope you will not hesitate to call on me in the future if I can be of assistance to you. Should you have any additional questions or comments, please let me know or visit our website at www.veterans.senate.gov .

Sincerely,
Johnny Isakson
United States Senator

Latest news from Donald M Grant Publishing

Welcome to issue #95 of the Donald M. Grant Newsletter

26 August 2015

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1. THE DARK TOWER: REMARQUED COPIES
2. STEPHEN KING ARTIST/GIFT EDITIONS AVAILABLE
3. JEFFREY JONES - IDYL-I’M AGE BOOK COLLECTION
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In case you haven’t heard, Sony has announced that the first
Dark Tower movie will be released on January 13, 2015! Goggle
it.

Note - If your order is over $300.00 you may pay in 3 monthly
installments. Please say so in the Comment box when you check
out. Your order will be shipped to you after the final payment is
made.

1. THE DARK TOWER: REMARQUED COPIES

Phil Hale and Jae Lee have done some more original illustra-
tions in copies of the Dark Tower novels they illustrated. For the
first time Jae Lee has remarqued copies of the British Limited
Edition of THE WIND THROUGH THE KEYHOLE. You can
choose the illustration you want and they will sold in the order
that we receive the on-line order (please do not phone our
office). If the book you want has been sold you will be offered
alternatives (putting second and third choices in your order
won't hurt).

Orders can be placed and these new images can be seen at:

https://secure.grantbooks.com/DT2-Remarqued.html

2. STEPHEN KING ARTIST/GIFT EDITIONS AVAILABLE

Still available are the Artist Editions of THE DARK TOWER VII:
THE DARK TOWER (signed by Michael Whelan) and THE 
WIND THROUGH THE KEYHOLE (signed by Jae Lee) and the
slipcased Gift Edition of THE TALISMAN (signed by Peter
Straub and Rick Berry) and BLACK HOUSE. Links to the specif-
ic pages are at:

https://secure.grantbooks.com/

3. JEFFREY JONES - IDYL-I’M AGE BOOK COLLECTION

Now available is IDYL - I’M AGE, a 96 page over-sized 9” x 12” art
book collecting these two legendary graphic strips by the late
Jeffrey Jones. IDYL ran in the pages of the National Lampoon while
the later I’M AGE appeared in Heavy Metal Magazine.

Collected for the first time are the pages of these graphic strips
(both written and illustrated by Jones). This volume, published in
both Hardcover and Trade Paperback versions, has both an
Introduction and an insightful Afterword by award winning artist George Pratt.

Note- Due to a late production error the I'M AGE strip from the
October 1982 edition of Heavy Metal Magazine is missing from this
collection. Direct orders will receive a copy of this missing page as
well as a copy of IT’S GARBAGE COMING, a Jeffrey Jones
Postcard Book published by Donald M. Grant, Publisher, Inc..

Hardcover Edition - ISBN 1-880418-77-0 - $39.99
Trade Paperback Edition - ISBN 1-880418-78-9 - $24.99

https://secure.grantbooks.com/JeffreyJones.html

Other Jeffrey Jones books are also available at the above web
page.

Thank you.

Robert K. Wiener, President
Donald M. Grant, Publisher, Inc.

ZerOes by Chuck Wendig

ZerOes by Chuck Wendig

On Sale: 8/18/2015 | ISBN 13: 9780062351555



In the vein of David Ignatius’s The Director and the TNT series Leverage, Zer0es follows five hackers--an Anonymous-style rabble rouser, an Arab spring hactivist, a black-hat hacker, an old-school cipherpunk and an online troll---who are scooped up by the U.S. government and told they face prison sentences, they take the deal that’s offered them: working as white-hat hackers in service to their nation.



Chuck Wendig’s new novel is a witty and exhilarating thrill-ride through the underbelly of cyber espionage.

Five hackers are scooped up by the United States government and told they can avoid prison sentences if they opt to do a year’s time working as white-hat hackers in service to their nation. But they quickly discover that behind the scenes lurks a sinister NSA program, an artificial intelligence code-named Typhon, that has origins and an evolution both dangerous and disturbing, and that will soon be out-of-control.

Can the hackers escape the government and confront Typhon and its keepers? What happens when they discover they were chosen by Typhon itself? What is their true purpose? Will their own secrets be exposed and their lives made forfeit?



About the Author:



Chuck Wendig is a novelist, screenwriter and game designer. He’s the author of many published novels, including but not limited to: Blackbirds, The Blue Blazes, and the YA Heartland series. He is co-writer of the short film Pandemic, the feature film Vessel, and the Emmy-nominated digital narrative Collapsus. Wendig has contributed over two million words to the game industry. He is also well known for his profane-yet-practical advice to writers, which he dispenses at his blog, terribleminds.com, and through several popular e-books, including The Kick-Ass Writer, published by Writers Digest. He currently lives in the forests of Pennsyltucky with wife, tiny human, and two dogs.

The Dragon Engine - Andy Remic

The Dragon Engine - Andy Remic



Hi-octane fantasy from the natural successor to David Gemmell.

Five noble war heroes of Vagandrak get drunk one night and sign a contract – to journey to the Karamakkos in search of the Five Havens. There, it is written, there lies untold, abandoned wealth and, more importantly, the three Dragon Heads, legendary jewels claimed to give unspeakable power and everlasting life to those who wield them.

But the Dragon Heads aren’t what the adventurers think they are, and the world has not encountered their like in many, many generations!

Praise for The Dragon Engine:

“A thunderous hammer-blow of a novel, brimming with the best sorts of savagery and nastiness.”
- Ian Graham, Author of Monument

"The Dragon Engine is a not-f***ing-around fantasy. A blood-soaked tribute to Tolkien from the worthy successor to David Gemmel’s throne.”
- Gavin G. Smith, Author of Veteran, War in Heaven, Age of Scorpio and A Quantum Mythology

If Then - Matthew De Abaitua

If Then - Matthew De Abaitua



The intriguing literary SF second novel from the author of the Clarke Award-nominated The Red Men...

In the near future, after the collapse of society as we know it, one English town survives under the protection of the computer algorithms of the Process, which governs every aspect of their lives. The Process gives and it takes. It allocates jobs and resources, giving each person exactly what it has calculated they will need. But it also decides who stays under its protection, and who must be banished to the wilderness beyond. Human life has become totally algorithm-driven, and James, the town bailiff, is charged with making sure the Process’s suggestions are implemented.

But now the Process is making soldiers. It is readying for war — the First World War. Mysteriously, the Process is slowly recreating events that took place over a hundred years ago, and is recruiting the town’s men to fight in an artificial reconstruction of the Dardanelles campaign. James, too, must go fight. And he will discover that the Process has become vastly more sophisticated and terrifying than anyone had believed possible.

Praise for If Then:

“If Then is a love story, the history of a marriage, a topical meditation on the end of capitalism; best of all, it is a bone-deep, blood-sweet British fantasy, naive and ingenious as William Morris and as warpedly nostalgic as Richard Jeffries’ After London. As disturbingly hyperreal as any Pre-Raphaelite painting, If Then imagines what the end of history really will really look like, what’s really at stake, and maybe, just maybe, what we can do about it.”
- Simon Ings, author of Wolves

“Sumptuously written, with prose that glitters with a dark lustre like a Damien Hirst fly collage. intricately plotted, and a satirical point as sharp and and accurate as the scalpel of a brain surgeon: De Abaitua operates on the smiling face of the present to reveal the grimacing skull of the future.”
- Will Self

Windswept - Adam Rakunas

Windswept - Adam Rakunas



Padma Mehta has to save her city, her planet, and Occupied Space from a devastating crop-killing plague — all before Happy Hour.

Labor organizer Padma Mehta is on the edge of space and the edge of burnout. All she wants is to buy out a little rum distillery and retire, but she’s supposed to recruit 500 people to the Union before she can. She’s only thirty-three short. So when a small-time con artist tells her about forty people ready to tumble down the space elevator to break free from her old bosses, she checks it out — against her better judgment. It turns out, of course, it was all lies.

As Padma should know by now, there are no easy shortcuts on her planet. And suddenly retirement seems farther away than ever: she’s just stumbled into a secret corporate mission to stop a plant disease that could wipe out all the industrial sugarcane in Occupied Space. If she ever wants to have another drink of her favorite rum, she’s going to have to fight her way through the city’s warehouses, sewage plants, and up the elevator itself to stop this new plague.

Praise for Windswept:

“Like all the best speculative fiction set in the future, Windswept is also about the way we live now, and Adam Rakunas tackles what matters most with a metric ton of humor and heart. A promising, thrilling debut.”
- Robert Levy, author of The Glittering World

“Lush and exotic, Rakunas’s Windswept is like the booze that powers his world: a delightful cask aged añejo rum that keeps revealing greater complexity and depth the more time you spend with it. I didn’t realize I had been lacking rum-running space opera in my life, but after Windswept, I definitely have a thirst for more.”
- Mark Teppo, Author of Earth Thirst and co-Author of The Mongoliad

Empire Ascendant - Kameron Hurley

Empire Ascendant - Kameron Hurley



Loyalties are tested when worlds collide…

Every two thousand years, the dark star Oma appears in the sky, bringing with it a tide of death and destruction. And those who survive must contend with friends and enemies newly imbued with violent powers. The kingdom of Saiduan already lies in ruin, decimated by invaders from another world who share the faces of those they seek to destroy.

Now the nation of Dhai is under siege by the same force. Their only hope for survival lies in the hands of an illegitimate ruler and a scullery maid with a powerful – but unpredictable –magic. As the foreign Empire spreads across the world like a disease, one of their former allies takes up her Empress’s sword again to unseat them, and two enslaved scholars begin a treacherous journey home with a long-lost secret that they hope is the key to the Empire’s undoing.
But when the enemy shares your own face, who can be trusted?


Praise for The Mirror Empire, the first in the Worldbreaker Saga:

“The Mirror Empire is an extraordinary novel. The scale and invention here makes it essential reading but the characters make it remarkable. None of them are heroes and none of them have the comforting sense of having read the book they’re in. They’re all flawed, terrified people doing what they can to survive. Seeing them struggle even as the stakes are raised makes for a reading experience as packed as it is tense. Book 2 can’t get here fast enough.”
– Alasdair Stuart

“The Mirror Empire is the most original fantasy I’ve read in a long time, set in a world full of new ideas, expanding the horizons of the genre. A complex and intricate book full of elegant ideas and finely-drawn characters.”
– Adrian Tchaikovsky, author of The Shadows of the Apt series and finalist for the 2014 Gemmell Legend Award