creekmores book review

CREEKMORES BOOK REVIEW

I don't know what but something has gone wrong with the gadget that links Amazon products to this blog. Until it is fixed, I've added a daily links page to my web page. I'll give you the link and when you are ready to buy from Amazon please go through that page first. Just like if you'd gone through a link in this article, I'll get credit for your purchase. You pay no extra, I get paid from commission to keep writing. Here's today's link:

www.bisonpress.com/dailylink030811.html
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Creekmore, our buddy over at http://www.thesurvivalistblog.net/ was kind enough to send me his brand spanking new book, “Dirt-Cheap Survival Retreat”. While this was a free book sent for review, it only costs $12. So you can almost be sure I wasn’t unduly influenced by this gift. I would have gladly bought it myself. I hope by now we can all agree that when I’m filled with anger and rage and disgust I let it all out on this blog. I’ll cut off my own nose to spite my face. Let me tell you a quick story to illustrate this, then we’ll get to the review ( you should also know by now that I’m long winded to little purpose ). While in the military I was an MP stationed to a security unit. Yes, I was pretty much a drunk derelict and not that great at what I did, but the military just stuffs warm bodies into position with little regard to their abilities ( you broomstick-up-the-ass types will of course disagree but that’s only to satisfy your own ego ). The thing was, if you did your tour, a private defense contractor would hire you just because you had a Top Secret clearance. This saved them so much money they could take an untrained person, school them into the position cheaper. I didn’t need college, just that clearance from Uncle Sam. As I said, I was a drunken idiot. I had been shuffled into the “problem child” squad with the rest of the malcontents where I was pretty happy. One day I got pissed off about something and decided that in revenge I was going to ticket everyone exiting at the main gate that failed to stop their vehicle at the faded stop line. This was pretty wise on my part, as opposed to my more desired plan of shooting anyone that failed to stop at the gate ( the regulars wouldn’t even assume you weren’t going to wave them in as a formality ).

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Anyway, this chicken-crap driving infraction ticket was my way of sharing my displeasure. I was writing tickets as fast as I could, bagging several officers Captain and above. Since the bureaucratic wheels grind slowly, and this was pre-cell phone, it took awhile for the unit commander to get an ear full from the base commander who called me at the gate and demanded I cease and desist writing traffic tickets. Let me tell you, I was so proud of myself. The very next day a crew was out repainting the line and installing a brand new stop sign ( I had merely enforced the law- the painting and sign was to forestall future high ranking complaints about how the poor dears didn‘t know they should have stopped their cars at a T intersection ). Which of course I proudly called MY stop sign. Then, not surprisingly, a week later my top secret clearance mysteriously got lost/revoked in a paperwork shuffle. There went my future job in Hawaii as a well paid civilian. Did I care? Do I care even today as I live poor in a cold climate? Hell no. I’m proud to have pissed off so many people. Especially officers. My point is, should a crappy book be sent to me for review, I’ll tell you it sucks even if I don’t get anymore free ones sent to me.

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Creekmores book did not suck, lucky for him. First off, it was cheap for a Paladin book. $12 is practically a freebie for them. Secondly, it didn’t have pictures just for the sake of filler like a lot of Paladin books do. And not a lot of white space. I was surprised as can be, let me tell you. A third surprise was that I actually enjoyed the book. To be honest I didn’t like his first book. It was just a cut and paste from his blog, or close enough anyway. I’m not saying it was bad writing or a rip-off, it wasn’t. It just wasn’t new or exciting. This book, Dirt-Cheap Survival Retreat, is pretty much 99% new writing. I didn’t say new subject matter, I said new writing. Rehashing the same old crap is what all of us modern survival writers do, for the most part. In large part this is due to the fact that history is pretty much repeating itself forty years later, and the first time around it was covered pretty well. We spruce it up with new areas such as LED lighting, humanure composting, new insulation and new guns ( or, newly available old guns anyway ) but for the most part it is old hat. So new writing is necessary to make old news palatable.

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Next up, we have his format. This is a compact book. It gets right to the point and concisely covers all aspects of an affordable retreat, affordable shelter and affordable preps. No, it doesn’t go into much detail about everything. This is a book that instructs the newbies how to “get-er-done”. In and of itself, this book alone will be enough instruction on how to find land, buy a trailer, set up off grid utilities and stockpile fuel and food for the collapse. It isn’t the decisive book on all the above, but it is enough for most people. He doesn’t spend thousands of words debating the pro’s and con’s of every single aspect like I do. But electrons are cheap and paper isn’t. For a 25 to 30,000 word book, this actually covers a lot of ground well. I don’t agree with a lot of it, but I can’t argue that this isn’t a damn good plan for most people. This isn’t the cheapest plan, but it is the cheapest plan for normal people. By normal, I mean those dragging along a wife or wanting to stay warm all the time. I know I have a few min ions that agree with me that living in the desert in a tent is cool. And that in the winter, fifty degrees is considered warm. But I know almost everyone wants near normal. So Creekmores plan is probably better for them than mine.

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Luckily for me, his plan and mine are far enough apart that his is no threat to my pathetic little empire. I’m still the super frugal king. Creekmore is the moderate frugal guide. So, since I detect absolutely no threat to my niche, I can happily recommend his book to you. Really, there are few new ideas here. But that isn’t the point. The point is that here in one spot is a concise plan covering all you need to get started living in an affordable retreat. You could look over several web sites for dozens of hours to get this info free, or you could just buy this affordable book and have the info ready made. In capsule form. And there it is on paper, ready to be picked up and easily consulted as you plan and dream. Better yet, the reluctant partner can also browse through it and have all their nagging questions answered. How will we flush our crap? How will I see in the dark? How will I get to watch “Days Of Our Lives”? How can I possible live without a mortgage?

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I could nitpick over the ideas for pages. But it all boils down to this. For most of you, this is a great resource on how to move off the gerbil wheel cheaply. Most of my disagreements are not even over the fundamental ideas which are sound. Just over a detail or two. Not even enough to blather on about. Which is why I fleshed out today’s article with my personal anecdote. This book is basically sound. Just because I would do a lot of things cheaper doesn’t matter. For 99% of you, this is a great book. I recommend it. For that 1%, you are too cheap to buy this book. And all your super frugal methods are written about free here.

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My e-mail is jimd303@netzero.com
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