Tales of the Fiction House

HAPPY NATIONAL AUTHOR’S DAY

Posted on November 1, 2015 by Raji Singh

Our Founder, James Thaddeus “Blackjack” Fiction
‘Tell our stories, Raji. If you don’t, it will be as if we never lived.’
These whispering cries of joy and sorrow rise from the bookshelves and portraits in the Fiction House.
I cannot refuse.
(Artwork enhancements by: Joseph Rintoul)

By Raji Singh

In honor of National Author’s Day, here is a chapter from Fiction House Publishing’s newest release by Mark Rogers, The Seasons of My Giving Back.

* * *

CHEF R.K.’S GOURMET SURPRISE

Ingredient I: A Large Portion of Can Do

Once upon a time as a lad, I possessed a plastic picture finger ring. From the first day I saw it in the bric-a-brac shop – MAGIC! Twist it, just slightly. A glittery red, white, blue image quickly changes, back and forth, from Old Glory to President Kennedy. I listen as his courageous profile challenges me:

“Ask not what your country can do for you, Raji. What can you do for it, hmm?”

I fury, fume, and wonder aloud. “How can I help? There must be a way. There must!” But, to a ten year old in Cincinnati, everything seemed right in my world.

When my parents overheard me and saw the ring they said, “Raji, you are too young for the late President’s Peace Corps. Yet there is much you can do.”

For this task, the trips to their homeland, Lindia.

Though Lindia is but my adopted country, as an orphaned foundling, its kind people helped saved my life following the typhoon.

So this is where I began my many ‘can do’ summers, volunteering for something I’d not anticipated, certainly not relished – the road kill clean-up crew. Many wonderful things came from it:

Just one of them – meeting lifelong friend, Chef R.K.

(His real name is Rhandi Khan. But because of his unusual roadwork, initials R.K. seemed more appropriate.)

Ingredient II: A Touch of Magic

A type of painting similar to the here-now flagged-later Kennedy ring, murals the side of Chef R.K.’s twenty-foot long wagon that sits alongside the road in the Lindian Woods. The painting shows Lindia’s Goddess Nardesha.

Blink and her outstretched palms lift from her creamy silk gown. She raises upward, Heaven bound.

Other images painted on the wagon: long lines of crunched road kill. You can almost hear Nardesha whisper to them, “Come with me, my gentle creatures. The bondage of your spirits to this earthly realm is complete.”

You blink; mongoose, cobra, lizard, squirrel, a fish – a FISH? – And dozens of other artist-depicted road kill puff out, are reborn, and then parade proudly skyward.

“You like picture?” Chef R.K. asks, hardly looking away from his cooking. His grill is the length of the wagon, and three-feet deep. Covering its surface are sizzling meats he filleted from flattened critters. They intermingle with steamy vegetables and pots of bitter-smelling broth.

R.K, in his 40’s is lean and tan, his face clean-shaven. He is shirtless, and in short pants to keep cool in the warm Lindian sun. His arms, hand and head move so fast you’d think his ancestors were octopus.

His magic dust he sprinkles constantly: Ground herbs and spices in pouches hanging from his belt. They marry the bill of fare then birth tantalizing sweet scents.

R.K. controls his outdoor kitchen as a concert pianist does piano keys.

Nothing burns.

He removes sumptuous morsels, large and small, round, square, long, that were once animal sacrifices to the speeding steel gods of the highways. Now the critters are platefuls of inviting delicacies. Mongoose-cobra, rat-wildcat, eternal enemies sautéed together as one. He passes the dishes quickly to a line of other volunteer boys and girls who distribute them to the hundreds of bedraggled humanity.

“The impoverished, Raji” he says, putting his mouth near my ear so I may hear midst the clattering pots and pans. “They too have the right to taste the wealth of Goddess Nardesha’s sumptuous array of bounty. Her food minions such as I; we have the ability to provide it, lovingly, tastefully. This is why I do what I do. I serve but the freshest of kill.”

Because of all the chattering of the gathering, and all the happy eating sounds, I can hardly hear Chef R.K. say “hello-goodbye” to my parents. He knew they were bringing me. After hugging me, they leave, not wanting to be in the way.

I know I won’t see them for weeks, but it is hard to feel my sadness at their departure for too long because R.K. instantly puts me to work midst the frenzy.

Ingredient III: Endless Humble Offerings

Everything R.K. serves comes from the Lindian Woods. He points to boxes of orange and yellow cocoa pods other volunteers gather. “Crack open. All these, Raji. Separate bean from white.” His voice necessarily is staccato, to keep pace with his swift actions.

I slam the pods together like castanets. They open easily. The insides are marshmallow soft, chocolaty pungent. I barely have time to taste it. R.K. ratchets it away and spreads it on the grill for flavoring. He waves his arms from his chest, outward, to indicate to me the impoverished.

“Today, we serve them. “So we eat last,” he orders.

When all the pods are open – “Good Raji,” he says tersely. “Now. Sprinkle this on the oxen’s grass. He gives me a bucket of sour smelling powder. “When that is done. Shovel up their droppings. Bring them to me.”

One of the other busy volunteers – a freckled, black haired girl my age, who for reasons I couldn’t yet understand at that time in my life – smiles hugely at me. She whispers, “The powder is R.K’s secret extract. It makes the droppings smell sweet as clover when burned. This is a must. Because it is with it he heats the grill.”

She fidgets timidly in her jeans and t-shirt. Her black eyes sparkle. She smells sweet, like vanilla ice cream. “My name is Reena, Raji.”

Dozens of tasks I accomplish that first day on the road kill crew – stoking the lavender aroma flames, washing pans, slicing pineapple, mashing mango – all for the purpose of feeding those in need.

By now, I am drained of energy.

Reena brings fresh coconut milk and we share a half-shell. Inconspicuously, she wipes my face so R.K. doesn’t see we sneaked it. Briefly, she holds my hand. Her fingers are warm, lithe. I breathe deeply. This moment of joy, like I’ve never known before, this brief respite from President Kennedy’s “can do”, renews me.

“Yes!” I shout inwardly. I suddenly understand, feel the importance of President Kennedy’s words. To me they mean, ‘only by helping others will you help yourself.’

Though we’ll eat nothing until all are fed, this thought would power me through the afternoon, then the rest of the summer, stay with me throughout my life. And the succulent scents – they would give me strength of willpower as well as muscle.

Ingredient IV: Fish, but Never Foul

Every so often, a volunteer runs up, shouting while carrying a dead fish. “She’s delivered another one.”

R.K. takes it, sniffs, smiles, says, “I can always count on her to deliver only fresh.”

‘Her?’ I look around. ‘Her, who?’ I wonder. Finally, another curiosity gets the best of me. I must ask, “How…a fish as road kill? How could so many keep falling off trucks?”

R.K. laughs, but his mournful sound seems a dirge. Midst his busyness, he takes time to explain. “There is sea kill too, Raji. The wood and fiberglass gods of the water – the yachts – they leave much torture in their wake. As long as there is sea kill and road kill you will find me here summers and holy days.”

All of a sudden, I hear a familiar voice. “Aarrk! Catch Raji.” I look into the blue sky. Just in time to put my hands out, and grab what a parrot drops – a four-pound fish – bigger than her, her biggest delivery of the day. “Ahoy, Captain Polly,” I shout, so excited in my surprise to see her.

“You know our Captain Polly,” says Reena. “Often she helps us.”

“We are the best of friends, in Cincinnati. Geez, Reena. It’s such a small world.” Suddenly I have this desire to show Reena all my hiding spots and favorite places in my neighborhood back home.

My smile gets huge as Reena’s as she looks at me. I’ll just bet she knows what I am thinking.

Reena stammers a little, and glances away briefly, deciding what she will say. “Umm, Raji. Uh, well… Captain Polly certainly does get around. Maybe you know her compatriot in the water?”

I look through the Woods, to the muddy river that parallels the road. I see the top portion of a tattooed brown shell bobbing above the water. “Turt!” Turt’s a land-sea creature called a Trumpeter. He’s the size of a giant Galapagos turtle. He ferried me on his shell from the ocean and through the Lindian Woods to safety after the typhoon. He saved my life!

Turt winks at me and with his beak-snout, and scoops up unfortunate sea kill and tosses it skyward.

Swooping Captain Polly seizes it in her talons. She grunts as she’s pulled slightly down by the weight. She manages to stay airborne.

Oh, so that how she’s able to deliver such huge loads. Her momentum plus her ‘can do’ willpower propels her.

Captain Polly drops the fish to R.K., then lights on my shoulder to rest.

I smile, and pet her glistening blue and golden plumage.

R.K. laughs. “Well, Raji. Appears it is old home week. It ought to be an adventurous summer for you three musketeers.”

I look at Reena and say to myself, “the four of us.”

Ingredient V: Replenishing the Spirit

It’s getting dark. The poor, fed for another day. Only the volunteers remain. We eat, yet there is plentiful uncooked food remaining.

“Nothing wasted,” declares R.K. “We’ll slow cook the remaining overnight on the cooling grill. It will provide many breakfasts.”

With the help of Turt who moseys up from the river, we all load the grill onto the wagon. Captain Polly squawks directions. “Higher, lower. Aarrk! To the left, right.”

We yoke the oxen and harness them to the wagon. The volunteers disperse.

Reena remains. She pulls me aside. Her face shimmers in the starlight. “My parents will be picking me up soon, Raji. I…I…just wanted to say how glad I am we met. I’ll be returning to help R.K. again next week. I…I’m anxious to see you again.”

Headlights beaming onto Nardesha indicate an approaching car. Reena kisses my cheek, and runs to the vehicle and gets in.

I feel…I don’t know what I feel. Surprise? Joy? Shock?

All these emotions roil wildly within me.

The Final Ingredient: Contentment

The oxen, so used to R.K.’s route, pull the wagon by rote. They’ll know to stop just before daylight, so R.K. can ready for another day’s cooking. He and I recline on sleeping bags atop an elevated bunk on the wagon. We are far above any wild animals that are fortunate to avoid becoming road kill.

Captain Polly is dozily reliving the day with Turt as she perches atop his shell. He rides on a sturdy sidecar-like storage platform attached to the wagon.

R.K. points skyward. “You will learn the constellations as summer passes, Raji. It is so relaxing to search the heavens. See there. That is Orion. Look, Andromeda. She is a beautiful young princess.”

I study the formation, but I don’t see stars, only Reena.

I think R.K. reads my thoughts.

He says, “You like Reena, yes Raji?”

I nod.

“Good,” he says. “She is a sweet girl. She has been a little helper of mine, almost ever since she could walk. She lives by my restaurant in Lindia City? I am sure you’ll get a chance to see her a lot.”

R.K starts telling me about himself, his wife and grown children, his history with road kill wagons – he has one of them in each of Lindia’s 40 provinces, all with their cooks, volunteers. I hear what he says, but my thoughts are on Reena.

Anxiously I ask, “Does Reena have a boyfr…

Before I can finish, Captain Polly, half squawks half sings,

“Reena, dear Reena. Our dear Raji is smitten.” Turt joins the serenade, with a trilling trumpeting.

The Final Garnishment

I went to the Lindian Woods one summer, decades later, to visit R.K.

Nowhere in sight.

I returned to Lindia City and stopped at his always-crowded restaurant. The road kill wagon sat cobwebbed in the alley. He took a few moments to visit.

“The steel gods of the highway Raji: They’re ever bigger, soar ever faster. Yet there is little road kill to collect. Who would ever think? It is because there are so few of Nardesha’s creatures remaining to pass from one side of the road to the other. Who can say why so many are no longer here: Chemicals, pesticides, changing temperatures, the flooding coasts? SAD! Which species will be next, Raji? Yours and mine?”

If you knew R.K. as I do, you’d know he is undefeatable.

He pats my shoulder before returning to the grill. “Raji, we road kill chefs have a new weapon. It is something so simple. It is called ‘NOTHING WASTED’. We make sure there is no waste in any of our restaurants. From just here in Lindia City, we feed hundreds of thousands of poor each year.”

R.K. smiles broadly as he happily flips, fillets, and fricassees.

(Join me every Sunday night at the Fiction House, your place for short story, lark, whimsy, and merriment. Read more about Shelva and meet the many residents as I archive their lives and centuries of adventures. You can read their origins in my novel TALES OF THE FICTION HOUSE, but that’s a different story. It’s available at Amazon, and Barnes and Noble.)

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, satire, whimsy | Tagged humor, imagination, James Thaddeus 'Blackjack' Fiction, new short stories, Raji Singh, Tales of the Fiction House, The Seasons of My Giving Back | Leave a comment

A HALLOWEEN SPOOKER: THE DISPUTIN’ RASPUTINS OF THE HIGH SEAS (AND THEIR WALK-OFFS))

Posted on October 25, 2015 by Raji Singh

By Raji Singh

Our Founder, James Thaddeus “Blackjack” Fiction ‘Tell our stories, Raji. If you don’t, it will be as if we’ll never have lived.’ These whispering cries of joy and sorrow rise from the bookshelves and portraits in the Fiction House. I cannot refuse. (Artwork enhancements by: Joseph Rintoul)

Unearthed from the tombs of the Fiction House, a Halloween re-treat.

* * *

The High Seas players:

The Pirates- a scurvy lot

Their Capt’n- a lice-ridden fiend

Captain Polly – Capt’n’s enslaved parrot

Turt- a good-natured land sea creature – almost a garnishment for the pirates’ meal

The Captives: Buzzard, Mariner, R-r-rose Heather, Kunta- enslaved by the pirates.

The Walk-offs- The lopped off part of the foot, from the tip of the toe to ‘on back just a tad’.

(Buzzard is telling tall tales. They mask the captives’ clandestine mutiny)

* * *

Buzzard strokes the mast then pulls away with a dramatic flourish. “Slick-as-a-badger, gents, Kunta slid down the mast, unseen by all but me. Before I could get here to stop him, he tangled his feet ‘round the throat of your unsuspecting mate. Wrung his neck.”

Buzzard invents as he tells. By playing-into audience’s endless superstitions brought on by the fog and grog-life of the sea, he manipulates them into believers.

“Kunta’s the cunning deceiver that sliced out the Moroccan’s tongue. Fed it to his ravenous Turt, who ingests our languages – to use against humans in the future,’ I’ll wager. [1] That beak-snouted demon is heartless. So Kunta cuts out the heart of the Algerian for him to devour while it beat.”

([1] Morrocan’s now a mute, driven mad by the cutting – so he can’t relay what really happened; that Mariner’s the slicer-dicer.)

‘A vile, contemptuous evil pervades the ship,’ thinks Captain Polly. From her perch, she watches the sallow-faced crew. Their attention never leaves Buzzard who is wending about the deck. Parrot knows she must do something to save herself from the stealthy young badger-human Kunta and his shelled beast that her Buzzard warns of: But, what? With leg chained. ‘Only hope,’ she thinks, is this dream-lover bird, Buzzard – but, ‘oh how to woo a human?’

“Kunta stalks,” Buzzard rails. “LOPPING more walk-offs for his necklace; PLOPPING his victims overboard. Some of the walk-offs are quick, devious. They escape. BEWARE! These walk-offs gone-feral hate humans. They lie in wait to destroy us.”

“What the Buzzard says gotta be true,” a pirate belly-aches to the others. It’s after lunch. They sit on crates near the railing – so they can vomit. The Rasputin-of-the-word – Buzzard, his sly comrade Rasputin-of-the-poison, Mariner, has upped the dosage – just a smidgeon – so that the savvy-to-the-tricks-of-the-sea, dregs, don’t notice. They think only, ‘the waves are having their way with gullets.’ They tremble continuously, and sweat so much that their raggedy limp clothes seem starched from saturating then drying so often.

(The poisons keep Capt’n stupor-fied. The pentad of mutineers know he may prove an asset if alive. One of them always guards him in his quarters turned prison.)

Crew’s superstitions beckon irrationality. In their poison-induced hallucinations walk-offs come to life; stalk. They begin believing they sail on what is becoming a ghost ship that may be overtaken anytime by the walk-offs. As Buzzard spins his tale, the dregs mutter vows in a dozen languages, about skirting the mast after dark and keeping near the rail to avoid Kunta.

“That’ll never do,” Buzzard counters. “Kunta and his shelled vampire straddle the ship’s sides, leaping on the unsuspecting.” Dregs look warily over the rail, wishing for land. It’s a thousand miles off.

The usually mawkish-squawkish Captain Polly is quiet. ‘The monster walk-offs will see I am no dreg. I will reason with them. Teach them the humans’ many languages. (Captain Polly knows at least a dozen.) Oh so valuable I can be.’ None of Captain Polly’s self-assurances quells her horror of, while still alive, being plucked, de-beaked and de-clawed by Kunta and Turt.

When not stalking the deck with his flapping, Buzzard’s usually arguing in the galley with Mariner about the tactics of their tightly schemed mutiny. But they agree, fully, with the results.

“How’d it get to this?” the crew whispers to each other. “Turt’s curse, for ravaging his island for the shell and meat of his relatives?” Others think hexing, by a tribal witch in retaliation for stealing Kunta.

Ominous signs of the walk-offs – stinking dried blood trails staining the deck – swell superstitions. A once-tranquil voyage of plunder and pleasure is now, nightmare. “Why’s our Capt’n keepin’ to quarters? Even at his sickliest, he’s stayed the deck wielding his whip. Why’s he issuein’ orders through Buzzard?”

Buzzard, in this short time, seems to have been elevated to acting Captain. Many pirates are loyal to him – ‘only way to survive’ – as they struggle to man-the-ship to get close to land.

THE TALE OF MAMA L’S SECRET SLICKENS

Mariner, allowed enough chain to come up for daylight, listens to Buzzard’s tales from the galley doorway. Captain Polly watches Mariner wipe fish blood from cleaver onto his neck-to-knee apron. In futility, she gnaws her chain, wary of the time he might want her for a ‘fixin’. From the first meal, he cooked – it smelled sweet as any Amazonian jungle cuisine –

– pirates shoveled it in. When they spooned some into Captain Polly’s bucket, she sniffed, recognizing ingredients humans cannot. (plants from Leezian’ bayou; recipes, come courtesy of Mama Lucy.) Flying over the ‘Big Easy’ Captain Polly had seen their effect on critters. They went battier than during a Gone Luna. So now, Captain Polly is subsisting on the array of bugs flying close to her perch. ‘Oh,’ growls Captain Polly’s stomach, ‘but to fly free of this ship.’

Mariner found the slickens – kegs of North Africa’s plants, almost cousins to poisonous Leezian’ claw-root and twig-lick – during his first day in the galley. “One dasha’ claw banish evil spirits.” Creviced old Mama Lucy had ‘scienced-up’ Mariner in her cabin’s kitchen-lab. “Cure most ills. Two dasha’ twig cures yer patient of inflictin’ devils. Three-’a-each, ‘n the devil escape; slitheren’ inta another ta inhabitate.”

Mariner always uses two-and-a-half, insuring deferred insanity. He can’t give three to finish the job – crew’s needed to get ship to shore. If it appears madness may arrive before land, he lessens the dose. For Buzzard, Rrrose Heather, her ladies and himself he prepares simpler fare. For Capt’n, who killed most of Mariner’s dear friends from the commandeered ship, Mariner prepares meals with another cousin-berry – the dung-flower.

“Gaarente-ad’,” Mama’ll testify. “Tuz cause most-vile hallucinatin’, yea inde-ad’.”

Mariner looks from Buzzard, who is finishing a tale, and glances at Captain Polly. She imagines he’s saying, “Ready to join yer Capt’n, Captain?” She gnaws shackle even more desperately.

TALE OF A SAIL

“Hoist starboard keel. Set jig-rigging north, northwest.” Buzzard mangles the orders of the ‘silent-Captain’, Mariner, rendering them illogical. Doesn’t matter; bedraggled crew sails by rote. No doubt, Rasputin-Buzzard steers the emotions of fear; Rasputin-Mariner helms the mayhem triggering it.

TALE OF HOW THE WALK-OFFS ‘REALLY’ CAME ABOARD

Late at night: Cleaver descends. “WHAP!” A piercing scream, ‘THUMPS’, of running. Scream stops with watery “PLOP”! Someone yells: “MAN OVERBOARD.” In the shadows, Mariner wipes cleaver clean and oysters-out slimy walk-off from the tip of leather shoe.

All the crew now wears shoes. ‘Does ‘em little good,’ Mariner grins.

From her manacled spot near the helm, Captain Polly quivers midst a new revelation: ‘New Cookie’s got a key. He can come for me anytime.’

Mariner eases back to the galley and re-shackles himself. He stows walk-offs in the Capt’n’ humidor. In a few days, as just another small way to nudge Capt’n closer to insanity, he’ll have Rrrose deliver it to Capt’n’ new quarters – a six by six dungeon-like room, rancid from 50 years of storing smoked mackerel.

Capt’n sleeps constantly, awakens only to his own screams caused by hallucinogenic dreams of sea creatures devouring him alive – more of the effects from Mariner and Mama’s ‘slickens’.

THE TALE OF A ‘GOOD’ LIFE FOR SOME

Buzzard, Rrrose Heather, and the ladies they now occupy Capt’n’ plush quarters.

“You’ll live with the bloody walk-offs throughout hell’s eternity,” Rrrose Heather, veiled as fortune tellers Capt’n always visited when in ports, soothsays to him – her personal revenge for what he’s done to she and her ladies. She leaves the humidor with him in his dungeon.

THE TALE OF A ‘WORSE’ LIFE FOR OTHERS

Midst hot-cold sweats, Capt’n removes lid and reaches for a cigar. The slimy walk-offs feel like jellyfish, their stench, worse than the rancid mackerel. He pushes humidor. Contents spill. His eyes widen as hallucinations spiral into a parade of the moldy gray-green walk-offs tip-toeing to come choke him. Too paralyzed to move, he screams, continuously, curdling-ly.

Reverberations echo through ship and shake the mast. Crew looks up at the sails, expecting to see Kunta and his monster, their arms, fin-claws stretched in victory sign to show that they now control the ship.

Buzzard swoops from the ship’s wheel. What to expect? He is sure he’ll find Capt’n, dead.

Captain Polly hops on the wheel to steady the ship as Capt’n has trained her for times when an automatic parrot is necessary. Though she loathes Capt’n, she feels pangs of sorrow. That lasts just seconds. She sings in an ecstatic combination of a half-dozen languages. “Blow the man down, mate. Blow the man down. You gave us time, we blew the man down.”

The crew doesn’t share her joy. If Capt’n is dead, hope for survival is with Buzzard.

‘Who will be at his mercy?’ Many silently vow ‘to become his slave if he protects them from Kunta and Turt.’ Captain Polly’s had enough of being a chained slave. She has another idea.

Buzzard returns to the wheel, relieved that Rrrose’s act of revenge hasn’t killed Capt’n. Captain Polly hops to his shoulder, brushes plumage sensually against his neck, gently nibbles ear, coos, “Lover bird. Loverbird. I’ll be true to you.”

(Join me every Sunday night at the Fiction House, your place for short story, lark, whimsy, and merriment. Meet the many residents as I archive their lives and centuries of adventures. You can read of their origins in my novel TALES OF THE FICTION HOUSE. They are completely different stories. My novel is available at Amazon, (Kindle and Trade Paperback) and Barnes and Noble.)

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, satire, Uncategorized, whimsy, writing | Tagged archeo-apologist, Captain Polly, culture, Fiction House Publishing, Halloween story, humor, mutiny, nostalgia, pirate story, Raji Singh, short stories, Tales of the Fiction House, whimsy, Whimsy alternate history | Leave a comment

BOOKTOBERFEST: CELEBRATE NATIONAL BOOK MONTH WITH THE CARPER

Posted on October 18, 2015 by Raji Singh

By Raji Singh

Our Founder, James Thaddeus “Blackjack” Fiction
‘Tell our stories, Raji. If you don’t, it will be as if we’ll never have lived.’
These whispering cries of joy and sorrow rise from the bookshelves and portraits in the Fiction House.
I cannot refuse.
(Artwork enhancements by: Joseph Rintoul)

October is National Book Month. I wonder if any cities or countries have Book Parades, festivals, or Book Games to celebrate. I hope you’ll enjoy this short scene from my novel, Tales of the Fiction House. It is a child’s surrealistic discover about the joys of books.

* * *

It’s 1826, Cincinnati. 4-year-old orphaned foundling Carper is taken in by a sea-crusted ancient mariner.

In only a few minutes Mariner and Carper are at Mariner’s isolated ‘STATEROOM.’ A barnacle on the backside of an abandoned warehouse, the ten-by-ten foot wharf-shack juts out over the Ohio. It’s built of rancorous vegetable crate-wood. The river’s fishy odor is less offensive. Two nose-smudged porthole windows peep out. The oilskin tarp door groans a tired welcome when Mariner moves it. Inside, Carper scrunches his face and breathes cautiously.

One can see the sloshing water between inch-thick gaps in the planked floor. The structure sways like a ship in even moderate knot breezes and this makes it truly home for the Mariner. “I built ‘er seaworthy, Matey. Can launch this ‘skiff’ if I’ve a mind. Sail away wheres I choose iffa the city starts overtakin’.”

Firmly anchoring the wharf-shack are shelved books. They line the walls. Mariner can’t read, but pretends. For hours, he will stare at the print and mouth words he believes should accompany pictures.

You stare intently, entranced by the array of Mariner’s exotic objects never before this moment have you seen. BOOKS – bound in leather dyed blue, black, and red. The bindings’ wild animal pungency – primal; the pulp pages emit sweet, pleasant mustiness of the forest. These soothing scents overpower the wharf-shack’s odor. These scents, intoxicating, will draw you under their covers. Soon you will sleep. Dream. All their pages of excitement, knowledge, mystery will awaken a passion for life’s grandeur in you that never will dull.

There is no way that at this moment can your child’s mind perceive all you feel so deeply. You only experience…

The BOOKS: They begin leaping from the shelves. They slide down Harpoon. Its long face, snaggled with sharp-barbed tooth, is still gleaming with the sweet ardor of some past battle glory. When they reach the floor, BOOKS, in cadence begin marching round a three-legged stool and toward you. ‘Hup! Hup! Hup, hup, hup!’ In parade. Voices echo in unison, ‘JOIN US, CARPER. DON’T LET US PASS YOU BY!’

How do they know your name? Other books are open on rickety stands and on the floor. You smile as an artist’s drawing of a wiry pooch ‘WOOFS’ at you. On the page next to him, a little wooden boy dances clip-cloppity. You want to tweak his funny, ever-growing nose. But, ‘Ouch!’ You are afraid of splinters.

On the pages of a floored book, a pretty, golden-haired girl in a silver gown looks down from atop a leafy tree. She reaches for you. She has wings of silver, ruby, and gold. She reminds you of the butterfly that spent the night with you under the cart. You whisper, “Calico?”

Calico, The Patron Saint of Foundlings (©2013 Image by Joseph Rintoul)

My Friend Calico
(©2013 Image by Joseph Rintoul)

‘COME FLYING WITH ME CARPER!’ she sings. She swoops down, takes your hand, and off you go go go, landing on the picture’s cloudy mountaintop. You lock hands and sing, skip and play ring around rosy, pocketful of posy. Ashes, ashes… all…fall…

‘No! No! You fist your hand in defiance. The fire-breathing monster won’t eat me,’ your thoughts shout, as you partly remember the nightmare. You blink. No longer do you hold her hand. You’re still clasping Mariner’s.

“Ouch! Carper, you got a clam’s grip there,” Mariner says as he bends creakily and closes the fairy tale book. Butterfly girl winks good-bye. Carper doesn’t feel scared or sad. He feels protected by Mariner and this place. He can visit the butterfly girl any time he wants. He will find many joys like her in – BOOKS. Carper will have read and absorbed each one in this dry-dock library before he turns eight.

BOOKS. They will become his life.

Carper will grow up to become James Thaddeus ‘Blackjack’ Fiction, publisher and abolitionist. (See picture)

(Join me every Sunday night at the Fiction House, your place for short story, lark, whimsy, and merriment. Meet the many residents as I archive their lives and centuries of adventures. You can read of their origins in my novel TALES OF THE FICTION HOUSE. My novel is available at Amazon, (Kindle and Trade Paperback) and Barnes and Noble.)

Posted in archeo-apologist, Children, Children's stories, Fiction House Publishing, humor, Short stories, whimsy, writing | Tagged Abolitionists, American History, Books, enjoyment of books, James Thaddeus 'Blackjack' Fiction, love of books, National Book Month, new short stories, purpose of books, Raji Singh, short stories, short story, Tales of the Fiction House, whimsy | Leave a comment

No. 104: THE ROUGE ROBED LADY OF THE SKY

Posted on October 1, 2015 by Raji Singh

by Raji Singh

It is said that a recent show has become the most watched event in the history of humankind. The audience count is in the billions; viewers on almost every continent. The prime-time spectacular happens only once every 15 to 20 years or so. No on-off buttons to push, or screen to peer at. Whether you’re at the Giza Pyramids, Eiffel Tower, Great Wall, or on the Orient Express. Just look up at the night sky.

You’ll see my dear friend Luny Mum in total eclipse in her Supermoon phase. If you didn’t watch the most recent blockbuster, check out these EarthSky pictures.

Luny Mum was my imaginary childhood chum. Her crescent smiles comforted me through my bedroom window whenever I felt sad before going to sleep. I could tell her my troubles and shed myself of my ‘glums’. I could share childhood joys with Mum and feel the warmth of her glow within me.

She is still here for me, most every night, and often, during the day. Just take time to search the blue cloudless or nearly cloudless daytime skies and you may see her conversing with her celestial mate, Poppy Sol.

Of course the rouge robe that Luny Mum dons is her trademark. Watch. It is like invisible sky mice beginning nibbling the make believe cheese of Mum’s surface.

Luny Mun Entering Her Eclipsical Glory (photo by Amy Rintoul)

Her eclipse commences. Ever so slowly darkness begins shrouding our Mum. After an hour or so she seems to completely disappear for a moment. Then it happens. The night sky, no matter how many stars are out, seems to be overtaken by her suddenly fiery red orb.

Just watch in awe, relaxing in contentment and amazement at the sky’s grandness.

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, Short stories, Uncategorized, whimsy, writing | Tagged eclipse, humor, James Thaddeus 'Blackjack' Fiction, Luny Mum, new short stories, nostalgia, Raji Singh, short story, Super Moon, Tales of the Fiction House | Leave a comment

A SUPER ECLIPSE IN A ROUGE ROBE

Posted on September 25, 2015 by Raji Singh

By Raji Singh

This weekend. Don’t miss it. Hasn’t been one since 1982. Won’t be another until 2033. What is it? A total eclipse of a Supermoon. And, this harvest moon will turn blood red. See this grand show and more in North America, South America, Europe, Africa, areas of west Asia and the eastern Pacific. Check your local times for the best viewing on Sunday or early Monday. Hope for clear sky. Saturn and its moons will be out and about, too.

Keep looking up! I know I will.

So, just what is a Supermoon? I hope you’ll see.

Here’s a Supermoon remembrance from Fiction House Publishing’s latest book, The Seasons of My Giving Back by Mark Rogers. It is most special to us here at the Fiction House.

* * *

OF SUPERMOONS, SCUPPERNONGS AND SUMMER

The blissful harvest of all our autumn experiences yet-to-come: Quietly it approaches.

I hope your fall is bountiful as was my first Lindian road kill crew summer of giving back. The yield from that time, a blaring brass band of the warmest of memories, preserves in my heart.

Almost every night of the remainder of that summer after I return home to Cincinnati, the starry sky and twinkling fireflies light the Singh family pathway that leads from the Fiction House Medical Clinic and into the nearby Woods.

Mother, Fa, and I take strolls – just as millions of other families do – after supper and before dessert. For many the repast is watermelon, ice cream, or pie. For us, it is Scuppernong grapes. They grow wild near the pond.

This is a time of evening for us to converse about our day while we feast on the tantalizing fruit of the vine. Our senses bombard us at once. The sweet pulp of the Scuppernongs plays gently across our taste buds.

Mother smiles and says, “It’s like a piano concerto and your tongue is the keyboard.”

The tart of the grapes’ thick skin, as its scent wafts into our nostrils, mixing with the damp of the Woods, seems to calm us.

“Feel your chest,” Mother says, putting her delicate hands to her blouse. “It makes your heart beat soft and slow, as if you’ve entered deep slumber.”

Who can hear the squish of the grape you bite into, against the cacophony of nature?

The Frog Brothers, Frer and Brer, from atop their bachelor lily pad, romance the lovely Toad Sisters on the shore with their ribbit, ribbit chorus.

The Ten Otters of the pond gently slap the water as they stare skyward.

Turt is trumpeting a Satchmo rift.

Crickets come out from hiding beneath leaves and join Turt’s serenade.

Though a breeze is slight, there are small waves on the pond. I cannot contain myself. I jump about excitedly.

“Hey, look everybody. The grasshoppers are surfing on the water.”

We look at the water world. The grasshoppers are actually ‘Hanging Ten’, (or however many a hopper has to hang).

Just then, all becomes eerily quiet as a broad shadow passes above us.

I squeeze Fa’s hand, probably remembering a similar occurrence from some little-boy nightmare.

Mother pulls me close. I feel her tremble and I grasp her. Is some vulture-like apparition circling above us?

Suddenly we hear a shout.

“Look up, you Singhs.”

Instinctively we do.

Wheh! Relief. It is Captain Polly flying overhead.

Mother calls, “Why did you scare us, Captain Polly?”

Captain Polly doesn’t answer. She squawks loud. “Aaarrk. See how close Luny Mum is, Singhs. She wants to say hello. In a big way.”

All the creatures of the Woods peer skyward. We follow their glance, leaving our own little world, and our own worldly concerns.

Ahh! Luny Mum’s way of giving back.

We enter her celestial wonder. There she floats, bigger than any of us ever remember seeing her. Her beams overwhelm the Woods, and turn the pond sheet white, like milk. We look at her through the clusters of grapes we hold, and it is as if she is gowned in the most beautiful shades of purple and red.

Neither Mother, Fa, nor I can speak. We can only enjoy the spectacle of light prisms our orb provides us.

I can almost hear Luny Mum speak to me as when I was an orphan foundling and had only she, Turt and Poppy Sol for my friends.

‘I am glad you brought your family to see me, Raji. From now on, I’ll help look after them, as I did you.’

Of course, science disputes the magic of the moment I am feeling.

We are seeing a Supermoon, the first of three this year. Technically, my Luny Mum is a “perigee moon’. Mum is massive, and extra bright, because she is about 50,000 kilometers closer than her regular full moon self, an “apogee”.

All science aside, to me Luny Mum and Poppy Sol are living celestial entities, just two of the few friends any orphan foundling creates in his or her imagination so we are not alone in a cold world.

My perigee Mum would visits many times that year.

She watches with Mother and Fa, as I discover the joys of spitting Scuppernong seeds.

‘He’ll shoot my eye out if he achieves any more distance or accuracy,’ Luny Mum laughs. She eyes Mother squeezing Scuppernong juice into a pitcher of lemonade. ‘Mmm! I can just taste it, Raji.’

Mother pours the mix into glasses, which we raise.

“Here’s to Luny Mum,” we toast.

“May everyone appreciate her brightness tonight!” Fa adds.

I remember seeing on TV, that people all over the world can see our Super Mum – from outside the Taj Mahal, atop Eiffel Tower, alongside the Pyramids at Giza, beside the Great Wall of China – all they have to do is look up.

* * *

Calico, A Foundling’s Gentlest Friend
(©2013 Image by Joseph Rintoul)

One night while we were ‘Scuppernoning’, my butterfly friend Calico flitted by to visit us.

She seemed to hover in the sky for hours. Luny Mum’s brightness shone through the multi-colors of her wings. The Woods and pond became an effervescent rainbow glow.

The eyes of all the Woodland creatures turned from red to orange to blue to green and back, over and again. Anyone lucky enough to be moseying the Woods at that time would have been treated to a light display more dazzling than any Fourth of July fireworks show.

Thank you Luny Mum, for a summer the Singhs and billions of others will never forget.

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, Short stories, Uncategorized, whimsy, writing | Tagged book release, Captain Polly, culture, eclipse, Fiction House Publishing, humor, imagination, Lindian Woods, Mark Rogers, new short stories, nostalgia, Raji Singh, short story, summertime, super moon stories, Supermoon, Tales of the Fiction House, The Seasons of My Giving Back, Turt, whimsy | Leave a comment

No. 103: THE SEASONS OF MY GIVING BACK

Posted on September 20, 2015 by Raji Singh

The poem that begins Fiction House Publishing’s latest novel, The Seasons of My Giving Back, by Mark Rogers. Enjoy!

* * *

JAMES THADDEUS FICTION, the FIFTH

The rapacious serpent of the sea,

Typhoon

Fangs bared, it shreds the crowded ferry on which I ride.

Torn from my parents, I cry.

“Jamie, come back,” they shout.

I alone survive.

Fate

As do all orphan foundlings, animal or human,

I retreat to imagination to bear my pain.

Destiny

New loving parents, Dr. Ben and Indira Singh adopt me.

Now I am Raji, an adult,

Ever learning

What is important to living.

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, satire, Short stories, whimsy, writing | Tagged alternate history, Fiction House Publishing, humor, imagination, James Thaddeus 'Blackjack' Fiction, new short stories, Raji Singh, short stories, short story, Tales of the Fiction House, The Seasons of My Giving Back | Leave a comment

THE LEGEND OF THE SCARLET TONGUED, BLUE MOUTH DEMONS

Posted on September 13, 2015 by Raji Singh

To commemorate the new school year, here’s a whimisical excerpt from The Seasons of My Giving Back.

* * *

School’s starting for some, just around the corner for others, and forever out for many. Here’s a school daze reminiscing that nearly scared the “be-jeezers” out of me, and made me truly experience how much more satisfying the giving back is than the taking.

* * *

From the sidewalk, you believe you hear terror in the voices of the Aru brothers. When you peek through their bookshop door, propped to allow in the morning breeze, you think you see fright on their faces.

Mother often tells you, “Never eavesdrop, Raji. It is impolite.”

You wish you had heeded her admonition. Nightmares, sweat drenching sleepless nights, and a discombobulated first month of school result from what you overhear. The street traffic is noisy. So you make out just pieces of the conversation.

“…They may well overrun all Cincinnati, those, those…”

Ari Aru finishes his brother, Sari’s sentence. “…Those scarlet tongued, blue mouths…”

Though it is still warm September, Ari and Sari’s next words freeze you, as if you’re a January snowman.

“…4th grade boys…”

“…turning them into…”

“…so hideous, so scary…”

You clench your school lunch sack and remind yourself, ‘You are a 4th grader, Raji.’

“Hi Raji,” Ari shouts, thawing me.

“Hello, Mr. Aru.”

“Come in Raji. The book your father ordered arrived. We’ll wrap it up for you to give him.”

Even though you’ve known these bearded and ancient Lindian neighborhood Uncles as long as you can remember, suddenly it seems you don’t know them. You hesitate entering their shop. The always-there baggy, blue-black puffs beneath their eyes, seeming gentle smiles, suddenly appear sinister.

“Do not just stand there, Raji.” Ari takes you by one shoulder.

Sari seizes the other.

These friendly bookish confines you’ve been in hundreds of times, becomes a trapping lair.

The brothers lead you to the counter. The business has an out of place scent, burning saffron. Strange chants, in a Lindian dialect you do not understand, emanate from tinny speakers in a back room.

Ari and Sari dress in white cotton dhoti shirts and multi-color silk pants. They keep, oddly, to the old world Lindian ways. They chew teeth reddening betel nut, yet worship Goddess Nardesha who forbade the addictive habit. They speak perfect English, yet stock only Lindian language books and newspapers. These things, that for you had been ‘just the way the brothers are’, now are ominous.

You begin believing – If you were a stranger passing through our neighborhood…those red teeth, and blue-black under-eyes…you’d keep right on going, lickety-split.

“What grade are you in this year, Raj?”

You stammer. “Four…fourth.”

“Hmm!” Ari looks to Sari and back to me. “Well you be very careful, Raji. Because boys your age…”

You don’t hear the rest of what he says, because you grab the package, and run out. You’re just sure you hear Ari say to Sari, “I just hope our Raji doesn’t become one of those scarlet tongued, blue mouths.”

Don’t know what one is: A zombie, giant lizard, horrific monster. Don’t want to find out.

* * *

Throughout September, you avoid walking by the bookshop. With time and distance, you start realizing your distrust of the Aru brothers is unwarranted. What you should fear is the scarlet tongued, blue mouths of whom they speak.

You look twice into alleys you must cross. You never know if a scarlet tongued, blue mouth may lie in wait, or what they may do to you. You shutter your mind to the possibilities.

~ ~ You may very well enquire, Dear Reader. “Why aren’t you asking an adult about the scarlet tongued, blue mouths?” ~ ~

It is because of another conversation you overhear. Sari Aru is on a street corner talking to a parent of a classmate. “So it got your son. I am sorry to hear that. But he will survive. Embarrassment will be his only illness. That is fortunate.”

Then Sari says. “If only they’d stop talking about it, then they would all be safe from the scarlet tongued, blue mouths.”

That convinces you. Your lips are sealed.

The next day you look close at the talked about boy. There it is, hardly noticeable, a slight tinge of blue to his lips. When he speaks, you see a slightly scarlet tongue.

You look at the mouths of other classmates. You lean too close to a girl’s face.

“What are you doing, Creep?” Margaret cries and backs away. “Are you spying on me? Mom wants you to report if I wear makeup. Doesn’t she?” She quickly wipes off bluish lipstick. “I hate you Raji Singh!”

Margaret runs from the room. You sink low in your seat as everyone looks at you – glaring, smiling, as if you two were a 4th grade ‘item’ and it was revealed at that moment.

Maybe confronting a scarlet tongued, blue mouth would have been easier than dealing with Marr-grr-ett.

* * *

That afternoon on the playground, ‘The Mystery’ solves itself.

Boys line up to climb the ladder to the slides. Mop-haired Joshua, a sly trickster, secretively shares one of his gimmicks. He takes a plastic pen from his pocket. He says, “The Aru brothers carry these at their store. If the pens go bad, they may look at you funny, but they’ll give you a new one. When you’re almost out of ink, just suck on the air hole, like this.”

The boys watch curiously. The ink rises slowly. Something strange happens. Maybe it is high readings in barometric pressure that day. Maybe Joshua is showing off and applies too much suck effort? The blue ink suddenly spurts from its tube – like red mercury from a thermometer in a Saturday morning cartoon.

Joshua spits, phhts, and phews as the ink coats his lips and seeps onto his tongue. His mouth turns blue, and his tongue scarlet. He runs wildly around the playground, spitting, phht-ing and phew-ing as he wipes crazily at his face.

* * *

The question you will always have for Ari and Sari, but will always be afraid to ask, “Did you know I was listening to you that September morning when I was in 4th grade? And, was it for my own good?”

“It was a giving back to me, simple lesson in honesty, wasn’t it? Thank you Ari, Sari.”

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, satire, whimsy | Tagged back to school, coming of age, Mark Rogers, The Seasons of My Giving Back | Leave a comment

No. 102: LABOR’S DAY (REPOST)

Posted on September 6, 2015 by Raji Singh

by Raji Singh (editor, Fiction House Publishing)

“…he died at age 52,” reports the network anchor, breaking the news of the death of….“A successful business person, he was known to proudly brag of working 16 hours a day, usually 6 to 7 days a week. Doctors report he died of sudden…

“Associates say, ‘He worked himself to death’. It’s reported his personal net worth exceeds one billion dollars.”

“Jack died doing what he loved most,” says his widow as her face comes on the screen briefly. “Making money.”

***

“I believe she was smiling just a little, when she said that, don’t you, Raji?” Tenille says playfully, as she comes from the kitchen and turns off the TV. “’He worked himself to death.’ They never say, ‘He took-it-easy’d himself to death,’ hmm Raji.”

I smile. “I knew him.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Not well. But enough to know he never took a break from the money chase. He was always pestering me, trying to buy one of my businesses. Just so he could turn around and sell it. I overheard a conversation at a restaurant between him and his wife. She kept telling him, ‘Slow down, Jack.’ He was on the phone through their entire meal. He obviously didn’t hear her.”

Tenille sits beside me on the couch, brushes her fingers across my cheek, and kisses my mouth. “I’m glad you’re not like that anymore, Raji.”

“Well, I was never quite like Jack. Still, you and the children changed me.”

Tenille’s josh, “They never say, ‘He took-it-easy’d himself to death,” is something I agree with wholeheartedly. It’s a sentiment I’m certain most, maybe all my ancestors here at the Fiction House practiced.

“Fortunately, it does not appear, mine sweet druzhyna husbant Raji, you will be featured in a news story like that anytime soon, eh?” Tenille is mimicking, kindly, my Russian immigrant great grandmother, Shelva Fiction. Tenille knew her very well. (I wish I had known G – Gra’ma Shelva. I didn’t, growing up so far away from her.)

My Pet Calico (©2013 Image by Joseph Rintoul)

Shelva was always involved, fully, with life every moment of her over 100 years. Her thousands of stories, many of which we’ve been publishing at Fiction House, certainly prove it.

Tenille imitates in a loving way the odd little Muscovite sayings Shelva incorporated into her ‘Amerika talk’.

“I learn English; Russian steppes by steppes. The consonants of North and South Amerika, they are an ocean away from the consonants of Asia and Europe. That distance – it is good. Because, then there is no worry about the Czar’s Cossack butchers disemvoweling you.”

This is what Shelva’s ‘husbant’, her sweet druzhyna, said when George Bernard Shaw published Pygmalion. “My Fair Lady, Shelva. It wasn’t long before she was speaking English as well as Professor Higgins, and writing like Shaw in never-ending journals.”

Shelva and Jack: I wonder if they had anything at all in common. Jack made money, and at age 52 that money made his widow smile, slightly. Shelva at over double that age was still traveling, still helping raise children, still helping fellow Muscovites to freedom, still writing of past, present and yet to come experiences that thousands would come to read. So many ‘stills’ for Shelva. She was always smiling.

I don’t think, of all the times I saw Jack, I ever saw him smile.

Posted in archeo-apologist, Fiction House Publishing, humor, Short stories, Uncategorized, whimsy, writing | Tagged culture, humor, imagination, Labor Day, making money, new short stories, nostalgia, Raji Singh, relaxation, Shelva Fiction, short stories, Tales of the Fiction House, Tenille Fiction, whimsy, workaholic | Leave a comment

OF SUPERMOONS, SCUPPERNONGS AND SUMMER

Posted on August 29, 2015 by Raji Singh

By Raji Singh

There is a wonderful Supermoon for the end of August. There will be another at the end of September. Predictions are it will be even grander.

Here is a story about one from long ago and far away from Fiction House Publishing’s just released book, The Seasons of My Giving Back by Mark Rogers.

Enjoy.