| This is Blair Babylon, your favorite romance author. Thanks again for signing up for my newsletter in the back of one of my books or in a giveaway! Okay, it's free now!If you haven't read my newest book Rogue and want to try it before you buy it, I have 2 extended samples of the book out, and they're free. See below for links! If you have read Rogue, pre-order Book #2 Order now! Links below. Now available on Barnes & Noble for Pre-Order, too! YAY! If you haven't read Rogue, jeez Louise, don't wait! It's available in ebook, audiobook, Audible, and paperback! Also, as noted, I have a PhD in virology and have some information on the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine that was submitted for approval today. More information from Dr. Blair on it and Q&A down below. Do me a solid favor here and click on some link in this email, please? Just anything? Just pick one. It lets me know that you're still reading my emails and want to continue to get them. I put some fun stuff down below for you. Please remember that I only email when I have something new, on sale, free, or awesome just for you! My newsletter-sending service occasionally just says, “These people haven't clicked on your emails lately, so they're gone now.” I then I can't get you back. Don't get gone-d by the email service. Clicky, please. Love, and as always, stay safe and mask up, Blair Babylon |
| Romance readers are the best. Seriously, the best. I love you guys.Romancing the Runoff is an auction by romance authors, and we're auctioning off everything. You will not believe some of the things you can buy. Phone calls with your favorite authors. Other art by your favorite authors. Hang out with Charisma Carpenter from Buffy. I mean, wild stuff.Here's my contribution, and you can win a copy or Order (and ONIM and Rogue,) personalized to you, before you can buy it.Bid on Blair's Books here!Wanna bid on amazing items from all your favorite romance authors, including a bunch of “buy it now” signed books?There are some amazing, amazing items up for auction. Take a look.All 914 Auction Items here! |
| There's all these books and I don't know what to get. Oh no! It's math!Hey, folks. Some people were wondering why there are several books of mine with the same description but different covers and names that are on Amazon and the other E-book websites. The answer is that it gives people a way to try and extended sample of the book of Rogue for free before they buy it. Amazon and the other websites only let you try twenty percent of a book before you have to put up or shut up. I don't know about you, but I used to go to bookstores or Barnes & Noble and sit in the café and sometimes read half of a book before I'd decide whether or not to buy it, especially if it was a new author to me. So, this is a way for people to take a look at the book and have a really meaty sample to try before they buy it.If you have bought Rogue, then you don't need to buy either Indecent Proposal or A Game of Billionaires, though if you want the complete Blair Babylon collection, I suppose you should download them for free. However, there is no new content in there, they are just part of the novel of Rogue.As you can see in Figure 1 to the right, Rogue is the complete novel, where as the other two are extended samples.Get Indecent Proposal for free here.Get A Game of Billionaires for free here. |
| Please pick something to look at and give it a cleeek.You don't have to buy anything. It's just to tell the Universe that you like my emails. It helps me, and I appreciate it. Thank you!Blair's New Book!Rogue is Maxence #1! It's dirty. Get it in ebook, paperback, or audiobook! (Whispersync'd audio, so it's cheaper!)Pre-ORDER Now!Max #2, ORDER, is available for pre-order in ebook! The audiobook will be up soon for p/o, too! It's really dirty. Pre-ORDER now!Have you read all of Blair's books?So many books! Here they are in the chronological reading order. Many of them are free or cheap! Links to the ebook stores.TAKE A LOOK HERE, Secret EpiloguesHere's your secret page with free epilogues to download to Blair's books with little tidbits and stories just for you! |
| Dr. Blair Explains It All For You Pfizer and Moderna both submitted their NDA's to the FDA this morning to approve their vaccines against Covid-19. This is the beginning of a hopeful new phase in this global pandemic. As always, this is not medical advice. I'm a PhD, not an MD, but I taught medical school, can explain the science, and I'll tell you what I'm doing. After my last Dr. Blair post, I got hundreds of responses back, and I'm just not able to respond to every one of them individually. I did some of them, but there were just a lot of them. So, I thought I'd answer a few questions about the ongoing pandemic, best practices, and the science behind Pfizer's vaccine. I haven't studied Moderna's, other than I know the science is very similar. “Is it safe to celebrate Thanksgiving with a family gathering?” No. Not in any way. Not at all. Please don't. Next week is the United States' Thanksgiving holiday, a holiday that is traditionally celebrated by eating a tremendous amount of turkey and pumpkin pie and then watching football. It is not safe at this point to have any sort of gathering with people outside of your immediate household. I'm sorry, I wish it were different too. We're in the home stretch. Don't blow it now.Considering that there is an enormous third wave of this epidemic sweeping across the United States and the world, it is vitally important to return to your most stringent lock down procedures. I understand that this sucks. My dryer hasn't worked for six months, but it's just too dangerous to allow a person to come into my house, upstairs, and repair or replace the stupid thing. This wave of the epidemic is going to be truly terrifying. Chances are, if you don't know somebody who's died yet, you are going to soon. The question really is just how many people you know who will die. A friend of mine was a doctor up in Boston just had to call a 15 year old kid and tell him that his mom had died of Covid-19, and it was less than a month after his dad died of Covid-19. Over a quarter million Americans and over 1.3 million people worldwide have died of this horrible disease. We now know that even if you do survive, it's very possible that you'll end up with heart damage for which you will need surgery to repair valves, blood clots in your lungs that may damage your lungs to the point where you will never play any sports or walk more than ten feet without gasping for breath again, causes significant erectile dysfunction in most men who get it, and can cause dementia in middle-aged or young people, like cutting your IQ in half. Even when I was writing science fiction dystopia, I never thought of anything as evil as this dang virus. Please, do not gather for Thanksgiving, because you'll spend Christmas in the ICU, and you'll be dead before 2021.“Does the vaccine work?” Yes. A lot. The latest numbers show that it prevents more than 95% of cases, and there is significant evidence that it will reduce the severity of the disease if you do have a breakthrough case. At the very worst, you'll end up sucking a little oxygen instead of dying on a ventilator. “Is the Pfizer's vaccine safe?” Yes. Pfizer actually started out with four different possible vaccine formulations. They chose the safest one to go to phase 3's. Over 42,000 people have been injected with two doses of this vaccine for the studies, and there were 0 serious side effects. Some people had a sore arm, and few people threw up. But let me say that again, 42,000 people, 0 serious side effects. ZERO. The Nature paper says, “there were no serious adverse events and no withdrawals due to related adverse events for any dose.” It may be the safest product ever developed. At those rates, it is safer than Tylenol, Advil, or Tums. “Do they thaw the vaccine before injecting it?” Yes. Pfizer's vaccine has to be stored in dry ice, which is -112F, but it is thawed in the refrigerator before injecting. They even warm it up to near room temperature before they suck it up in the syringe. (This is the most common question I am asked.) “Do they grow it in eggs? I'm allergic to eggs.” You're okay. Get the vaccine. The vaccine is not grown in eggs. It is an entirely genetically engineered product. There are no eggs in the entire process. Eggs do not get near this vaccine. It is totally safe if even if you have an anaphylactic reaction to eggs. As always, check with your own doctor for everything.“Is it vegan?” Yes. The vaccine is “free from materials of animal origin.”“I had an organ transplant and am on immunosuppressant drugs, or are otherwise immunocompromised. Is it safe for me?” Meaning, is this vaccine made with a live but weakened virus? The Pfizer vaccine is not made with either live or dead virus. It is an entirely genetically engineered product that only has one gene for the one spike protein on the outside of the virus when it infects you. Always consult with your doctor, especially your transplant team, to make sure any vaccine is right for you. However, there is no complete virus in this vaccine, either living or dead. You cannot get sick with Covid-19 from the vaccine. People with controlled HIV were included in the last arm of the Phase 3 study. So, I'd say yes. “Can you get Covid-19 from getting the vaccine?” No. The vaccine is a genetically engineered product that includes one gene from the virus, but does not contain any complete virus at all, either weakened or dead. There is absolutely 0% chance that you can get Covid-19 from the vaccine. “Are there any adjuvants or preservatives in the vaccine?” No. That's why they store it at -112F. I read the Nature paper and the phase 3 clinical trials, and there is no mention of any adjuvants or preservatives that are commonly used in vaccines, such as aluminum hydroxide, aluminum phosphate, and aluminum potassium sulfate, nor any mention of preservatives such as Thimerosal. To repeat, none of those are in the vaccine. Again, this is an incredibly safe drug product. “Dr. Blair, are you going to get the vaccine?” Yes. I will buy winter camping gear and camp in a line for up to a week outside a hospital to get this vaccine. I will absolutely take the vaccine at the very first opportunity. If you see me outside of my local hospital with a mummy bag and a thermal tent, banging away on my laptop with a 3000′ extension cord, you'll know I'm in line.“When is Pfizer going to start making doses of the vaccine?” Pfizer has been making doses of the vaccine for months. Once they decided which one of the four candidate formulations was the best and was the one they were going forward with, Pfizer made their clinical trial stocks and then just kept manufacturing vaccine “at risk,” which means they took the financial risk that if the vaccine didn't work, they would be stuck with millions and millions of dollars worth of vaccine stock they couldn't use. Since it did work, there are warehouses full of vaccine doses right now. As soon as the FDA stamps the application, before the ink is dry, the trucks will leave the warehouses and start delivering vaccine doses to healthcare workers and other priority people. And they are continuing to manufacture it. The current CEO of Pfizer, Dr. Albert Bourla, DVM, Ph.D., is a scientist, not a bean-counter or a lawyer. When he took over Pfizer two years ago, he changed the motto to “Patients First,” and he turned a toxic work environment into an organization that will literally save the world. I'm so proud of them.As always, stay safe, stay home, and mask up, Love, Blair |
Two additional things to know about these two vaccines – First, you need TWO doses of the vaccine for the vaccine to be fully effective. Don’t skip that second dose! Also, vaccines don’t work instantly. It takes 2-3 weeks after the second dose for the immunity to kick in. Many people think that right after getting a vaccine, they are good to go. This is not the case! You need to wait for the vaccine to work. And they DO work. GET VACCINATED.
ALL TRUE.