“The Adventures of the Puzzle Club” by Queen and Pachter. Reviewed by Jeff Baker (February 1st, 2023.)

Posted on February 1, 2023 by jeffbaker307

Adventures of the Puzzle Club by Ellery Queen and Josh Pachter

Reviewed by Jeff Baker

“The Adventures of the Puzzle Club,” the latest in publisher Crippen and Landru’s fine series of mystery short-story collections features two (or rather, three!) mystery masters and brings together the complete series of Puzzle Club mysteries begun by Ellery Queen (Frederic Dannay and Manfred Lee, in case you don’t know!) and continued in recent years by contemporary master Josh Pachter who sold his first mystery to Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine (edited by Dannay by the way!) when he was sixteen years old!

The Puzzle Club is a group of mystery lovers who get together and propose a mystery scenario which one of their members (usually the fictional version of Ellery Queen himself!) must solve. The puzzles are fairly-clued and the interactions between the club members are half the fun!

The initial five stories were written by Queen and published in the 1960s and 70s and include references to other mystery writers, quotes from the Sherlock Holmes stories and even a line from “Mission Impossible!” There is no discernible change in style or tone in Pachter’s continuation of the series, but the final story “Their Last Bow” has the club facing a real-life mystery with a “dying clue” of the type Ellery Queen specialized in.

Wrapping up the book are four mysteries about the Griffen family by Pachter (written mostly when he was a teenager!) concluding with the recent “50” which is a follow up of sorts to Pachter’s first story.

(And while Ellery Queen is the detective most often invoked, Pachter’s “Sam Buried Caesar” is a Nero Wolfe pastiche with grade school kids acting like kids in a perfect and grim puzzle plot.)

Altogether, a fine collection. Highly recommended!

Posted in Books, Crippen and Landru, Fiction, Mystery, Reading, Reviews, Short-Stories | Leave a comment

Ready for a Closeup for Rainbow Snippets from Jeff Baker (January 28, 2023.)

Posted on January 28, 2023 by jeffbaker307

Every week we post six lines from a work of ours, a work-in-progress or published or a recommendation of someone else’s work with at least one LGBT character. Posted at Rainbow Snippets here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974

Last week I promised more of my freelance photographer Oscar Del Fuego and his boyfriend/husband Lucas. I hadn’t expected to write two stories about them! This was the first, “I’m Ready For My Close-Up. Mr. Del Fuego” also for the old Monday Flash Fics prompt page and posted here: https://authorjeffbaker.com/2018/04/01/closeup-for-monday-flash-fics-april-2-2018-by-jeff-baker/

It was about 11:45 at night and Oscar was sitting on the edge of our bed with his camera, still talking about what had happened earlier in the day.

“I was standing there out in the street by the police car y’know,” he was saying.

I knew. He’d told me this story about four times earlier. Oscar free-lanced but mostly he took pictures for the local newspaper and a couple of news websites. Usually he didn’t bring his work to bed with him.

Here’s a little more:

“I’d gotten a call about three-thirty this afternoon,” Oscar said. “This girl, well, woman, was on the fourth floor of her apartment building. She’d barricaded the door shut and was out on the ledge outside the window threatening to jump. Uh, Lucas, I told you this before, didn’t I?”

I nodded. I was standing in a corner of the room in my jogging shorts, leaning against the wall, watching my husband jumping around as he was telling the story and loving every minute of it.

Reading this story now, I realize a little of it probably came from my husband and my telling each other stories we’ve heard several times before and each of us loving listening every time!

Next week, another love story, and what happens when I don’t read submission calls closely! See ya!

——-jeff

Posted in Fiction, LGBT, Oscar Del Fuego, Rainbow Snippets, Short-Stories | 8 Comments

Try And Relax On “The Sofa” for Friday Flash Fics, January 27, 2023 from Jeff Baker

Posted on January 27, 2023 by jeffbaker307

The Sofa

by Jeff Baker

The skies were gray and the grass was brown. It was in the cold of January when the narrative I am going to relate took place.

I had firmly believed the couch was out of my life, having been safely and discreetly dumped in a landfill. But to my abject horror I saw it days later on a street corner on the edge of town. Someone had doubtless fished it out under cover of blackest night and found it was too lumpy to comfortably sit on. Indeed, with what I had stuffed the big cushion, my late partner Griswold, I wouldn’t have wanted to sit down on it too.

But I couldn’t leave it there; someone might pick it up and take it home. They wouldn’t take long to investigate the strange lumps under the black vinyl. So I waited for darkness and stole a pickup truck. I tried to lift the sofa into the truck bed but I could barely get one end off the ground. There was a chain there in the back of the truck so I hooked it to the sofa and dragged it behind the truck, hoping to find a place to hide the sofa and Griswold again. Killing him was easier than hiding him.

I found myself driving through downtown during morning traffic, trying to look inconspicuous. Hoping Griswold wasn’t doing anything to attract attention.

They keep telling me that all they found under the vinyl fabric of the couch was lumpy fabric and a battered, worn frame and no sign of Griswold. I keep telling them he’s there. They say they checked the landfill where I dumped the couch and didn’t find anything. They say the couch I found either isn’t the one I used to have or I made up the story. I keep telling them it’s the right couch, that I killed Griswold, that I stuffed him in the old couch and disposed of it so they wouldn’t find out but the joke’s on me because he got out somehow and he’s laughing through bony fingers and toes and they say they can’t find him and I keep saying I killed him, and I keep yelling it and it echoes off the walls of the little room they have me in and echoes and echoes and echoes…

—end—

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Last week was the birthday of Edgar Allan Poe and I missed it in time for the weekly story. So, I put on my raven-feathered hat and worked this up. It went in more of an E.C. Comics direction, but I like it. So does Griswold. ——-jeff

Posted in Edgar Allan Poe, Fiction, Friday Flash Fics, Friday Flash Fictions, Horror, Short-Stories | Leave a comment

“Friday’s Child Is…” Rainbow Snippet for January 21st, 2022 (and for Friday the Thirteenth!) By Jeff Baker

Posted on January 21, 2023 by jeffbaker307

Every week we post six lines from a work of ours, a work-in-progress or published or a recommendation of someone else’s work with at least one LGBT character. Posted at Rainbow Snippets here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974

I slipped-up last week (Saturday the 14th) and didn’t post my Friday the 13th story! Even this one (“Friday’s Child Is Full Of…”) is about the week before! Here’s the whole thing https://authorjeffbaker.com/2018/04/12/something-for-friday-the-thirteenth-okay-actually-a-week-earlier-for-friday-flash-fics-april-13-2018-friday-of-course-by-jeff-baker/ and here’s the first snippet:

“You’re kidding!” I said. “You’re not going in to work today because of the date?”

“I’m not kidding,” Oscar said. “And I freelance; I really don’t have anywhere to go.”

“If it was Friday the thirteenth, I suppose I could understand, but the sixth?” I said.

“I’ve never had anything bad happen to me on Friday the thirteenth,” Oscar said, “but I’ve had a lot of things go bad the Friday before. Friday the sixth.”

I may be stretching “six lines” this week but here’s a little more!

“So, you’re staying here?” I said. “In the apartment? All day?”

“I’m not even going to go near the window,” Oscar said.

“All the better to keep a gang of shadowy boogiemen from grabbing you and dragging you out into the street,” I said.

“Lucaaaaas,’ Oscar said teasingly.

This one was written for a picture prompt of shadowy figures grabbing through a window! Spooky! And I had written about Oscar and Lucas before! We’ll sample that bit next week! See you then!

—–jeff

Posted in Fiction, LGBT, Oscar Del Fuego, Rainbow Snippets | 10 Comments

“Early Morning Thoughts Near a Quiet Road.” Friday Flash Fics for January 20th, 2023 by Jeff Baker.

Posted on January 20, 2023 by jeffbaker307

Early Morning Thoughts Near a Quiet Road

by Jeff Baker

Joey sipped from the can of soda and pulled his jacket around him. At least it wasn’t freezing and windy. He glanced around the old garage; had they been sitting here on the milk crates and talking all night? The lights under the canopy at the back of the repair and tire shop were starting to fade compared to the January dawn.

“Hey, Joey, what time you heading out again?” Rog asked.

“Sometime around nine,” Joey said.

“You can probably sleep on the plane.” Andrew said.

“Yeah,” Joey said. He looked around for the hundredth time that night and let out a deep breath. “How many times have we done this?”

“Counting when we were sixteen and got that six-pack of beer and drank it here after the store closed?” Andrew said.

“Yeah, and your Dad found us here, you hanging onto the wall and Andrew throwing up in the back because we’d set off the alarm trying to get in to use the bathroom?”

The three of them laughed.

“Yeah, and I had to work extra hours here on the weekend in addition to going to school hung-over the next day.” Joey said. “Wow, that was five years ago!”

The three of them sat there and sipped their sodas.

“You know, this was my first job, working here on the weekends,” Rog said.

“Yeah, and his Dad fired you right after the first weekend!” Andrew laughed.

All three friends laughed again.

“And now you’re heading out on your extended vacation,” Rog said. “What we call a career.”

“Yup! Gonna do great at the new job Joey!” Andrew said.

Joey nodded his head and blushed. “Thanks!”

“We’re gonna miss you, guy!” Rog said.

“Hell, we’ll see each other again! I’ll be back here!” Joey said.

“Yeah, but I may be leaving town too,” Andrew said. “Got a line on a job upstate.”

“Wow.” Rog said. “This is like end of school vacation but we’re all going our separate ways.”

“Okay, so let’s make it like school was,” Joey said. “Let’s keep in touch and try to make it back here, this very spot once a year before school would be starting up.”

“Think that’ll work?” Andrew said.

“Hell, yeah!” Rog said. “We’ll make it work! Friends like us shouldn’t lose each other!”

“Okay, we meet here every year at the end of summer, okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Right.”

The three friends clinked their cans together for what would be the last time.

—end—

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Looking at this I see similarities between this and my earlier story “Christmas at de Obra’s Garage.” Oh well! I guess the early-morning garage pic got me thinking of endings again!

—jeff

Posted in Fiction, Friday Flash Fics, Friday Flash Fictions, Short-Stories | Leave a comment

Flash Fiction Draw Challenge for January 2023—The Results! January 16th, 2023.

Posted on January 16, 2023 by jeffbaker307
Photo by Boris Ulzibat on Pexels.com

The draws for the January 2023 Flash Fiction Draw Challenge were: A Ghost Story, set in a Desert, involving a Roll of Film.

E. H. Timms wrote “Digging Deeper.” https://thinkingthinking123.blogspot.com/2023/01/flash-fic-challenge-digging-deeper.html

And I (as Jeff Baker) wrote “In the Amalfi Desert With Dead Folks.” https://authorjeffbaker.com/2023/01/16/on-the-amalfi-desert-january-2023-flash-fiction-draw-challenge-by-jeff-baker-1-16-23/

My special thanks to everyone who wrote or read a story and it’s never too late to write one and post it in the comments here and I’ll post it here!

See you on February 6th for the next draw!

———mike

Posted in E. H. Timms, Fantasy, Fiction, Ghost Story, Horror, Monthly Flash Fiction Draw Challenge, Short-Stories | Leave a comment

“On the Amalfi Desert.” January 2023 Flash Fiction Draw Challenge by Jeff Baker. (1/16/23)

Posted on January 16, 2023 by jeffbaker307

In the Amalfi Desert With Dead Folks

by Jeff Baker

AUTHOR’S NOTE; The draws for the January 2023 Flash Fiction Draw Challenge were; a Ghost Story, in a desert including a roll of film. I put on my Grimm’s Ghost Stories horror comic book hat and came up with this: —-jeff

Willie pulled his hat down to shield his head from the desert sun. He reached down and felt the pocket of his cargo pants. Still zipped up and he could feel the roll of developed film clunking around in the plastic tube.

He should have exposed the damn thing, but no! It had accidentally been developed.

He glanced ahead. Nothing but sand and blazing blue sky. Water in his thermos. He had to keep walking. There was an end to the desert, he knew. Someone would find the jeep that had broken down miles back. They would find him. That was good, right?

No! He had the damn film right in his pocket! The pictures which proved he was a murderer! He had to keep walking!

If he rescued himself, and destroyed the film, nobody would be able to tie him to Franco. Without the pictures, Franco’s death would be ruled a suicide. Nobody would know of their illicit partnership or the scams they pulled. And he would be able to withdraw the money from the account wherever he was. But he couldn’t find an ATM in the middle of the desert.

For what felt like the hundredth time he realized he should just toss the film into the desert; nobody would find it. It would be distorted, warped by the heat.

For what felt like the hundredth time he pulled the plastic tube out of his pocket and pulled the roll of film out of it. For what felt like the hundredth time he tossed the film and the tube towards the desert sand.

And for what seemed like the hundredth time the film zipped through the air back to the tube which hopped by itself back into Willie’s pocket.

“HahahahaaaaaHaaaaaaaa!” Came the sepulchral voice.

Willie looked up. He knew what would be there.

Drifting like a small cloud, sometimes blurry sometimes clear, Franco’s face was there above him. It laughed and taunted Willie.

“No, Willie boy! No, old partner,” it said. “You won’t get rid of the film that easily. The pictures are too good. And they’ll find the pictures on you when they catch up to you or to…your remains! Haaahahahaaaaaa!”

The ghost bounced ahead of him in the air, like a bouncing ball in an old cartoon over song lyrics.

“Are you headed the right way? Is this it? Or this? Or this? Hahaaaaa! How much water do you have left? Enough to wander to the edge of this desert? How big is this desert anyway? What’s it like to die in a desert anyway? HaaaaHaaaaaahaHaHaaaaa!”

Willie trudged on, the laughter filling his ears, the film jostling in his pocket, the heat rising up around him in waves.

His feet getting heavier, Heavier. With. Every. Step.

—end—

(Apologies to Joe R. Lansdale for the title!—-jeff)

Posted in Fiction, Ghost Story, Horror, Monthly Flash Fiction Draw Challenge, Short-Stories | Leave a comment

“In The Caves,” Part Two of my Serial Story is posted on RoM/Mantic Reads. Jeff Baker, Friday January 13th, 2023.

Posted on January 14, 2023 by jeffbaker307

Got a nice Friday the Thirteenth surprise this evening! “In the Caves,” part two of my serial story that began with “Toward the Marogas Hills” has posted on RoM/Mantic Reads! Here it is and I promise the story isn’t finished! https://rommanticreads.wordpress.com/2023/01/13/jeff-baker-in-the-caves/comment-page-1/#comment-307

Special thanks to Fiona Glass for posting my stories and starting and maintaining the zine!

Posted in Action/Adventure, Fantasy, LGBT, Promo, RoM/Mantic Reads, Romance | Leave a comment

The Natives are Friendly for Rainbow Snippets. Friday the Thirteenth of January, 2023 from Jeff Baker.

Posted on January 13, 2023 by jeffbaker307

Every week we post six lines from a work of ours, a work-in-progress or published or a recommendation of someone else’s work with at least one LGBT character. Posted at Rainbow Snippets here: [LINK] https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974

In this snippet from my story “At Least the Natives are Friendly,” https://authorjeffbaker.com/2022/12/09/at-least-the-natives-are-friendly-cool-down-with-friday-flash-fics-for-december-9th-2022-from-jeff-baker/ we meet Zack who is working as a warehouse manager on an icy alien world but finds some warmth for himself. We open with Zack doing something we are all familiar with; scraping his car window on an icy morning.

Zack had shipped out on a star freighter when he was sixteen and had worked his way across the solar systems as far away as he could get from his abusive family. He hadn’t minded being on his own and when the opportunity to run the warehouse on Blumenstuck had come up he’d jumped on it. When he’d been told it was winter most of the year there, he’d shrugged.

What the hey! Just like Wisconsin. Scraping the car window every morning was a pain, but the job wasn’t bad and it paid well and the Earth people shared the world with the Olarni, the furry humanoids liked the cold and had arrived on the planet two hundred years earlier, seeking a colder world.

I’ll break a few rules with this snippet and get to the nice, warm ending:

Zack grinned. That was the real fringe benefit, one that made him stick with the job and the cold mornings.

He came home every evening to a sweet, warm, furry pan-sexual Olarni man who would make any world Zack was on feel like home.

Emidos had been raised on Blumenstuck and he loved it as he loved Zack.

And they both laughed at the name the icy world had been given by the Earth colonists who had seen it hanging in space like a flower. “ Blumenstuck” meant “flower piece.”

“Really cold for a flower,” they would laugh.

An addenda here: I largely improvised this story in one sitting and the line about Zack fleeing his abusive family just popped up. Not like my life at all (thank God!) but I’ve known people to whom it was a reality. It makes the warm ending of the story all the sweeter! See you in a week! —–jeff

Posted in Fiction, LGBT, Rainbow Snippets, Science Fiction | 12 Comments

“The Snowflower,” by Jeff Baker. Friday Flash Fics for Friday the Thirteenth of January, Twenty Twenty-Three.

Posted on January 12, 2023 by jeffbaker307

The Snowflower

by Jeff Baker

Many years ago, in the Kingdom of Ice was a small village at the base of an icy hill. The villagers were not troubled by the ground being frozen all year because it had always been that way and they preferred it. Vegetables and fruits were grown in one of the caves under the hill where it was warm and wet. There were a host of edible mushrooms which provided protein on days when the hunters did not have much luck catching game. Water was no problem either as they were able to melt the ice for all the water they needed.

One day, however, on the edge of town there was something few people in the village had ever seen: a bright yellow flower poking out of a mound of ice. The younger villagers were puzzled as they had not traveled far and had not seen a flower before. So, they awakened the Ice Elder who was the wisest of them all and soon the Elder was there at the edge of town, wearing his warm robe over his fur pajamas and thick, warm boots on his feet.

The Elder surveyed the ice and the flower growing out of it.

“It’s a flower all right,” the Elder said, wiggling the stem to make sure someone had not just stuck it there as a prank. “A rose to be exact. I haven’t seen one of these in years.”

“How did it get there?” Akminar, one of the young men asked,

“Grew there, it seems,” said the Elder.

“Did somebody plant it?” Zomiach asked. He was the other young man. His father was trying to get him interested in dating Akminar, because of a rumor that Akminar’s family was secretly rich. They weren’t.

“I think the stem goes all the way down to the ground,” the Elder said. The ice pile was half as tall as the Elder who was just slightly taller than the two young men who had not quite reached the Age of Ascension. The Elder rubbed his chin. “We would have to uproot the flower or shovel the pile away to see exactly whether the flower is growing from the ground and if it is just the first of several. But I have a book in my library which tells of the ways of flowers.”

“My Grandfather says that flowers are inedible and therefore impractical,” Zomiach said, trying to look knowledgeable.

“The Mushrooms and fronds in the caves look more appetizing,” Akminar said.

“There are edible flowers but this isn’t one of them,” the Elder said. “Still…”

The Elder turned to Zomiach and Akminar. “Run to the village and bring everyone you can,” he said. “Practicality is all well and good, but genuine beauty like this rose growing in an unexpected place can make even the coldest of us feel warm”

—end—

Posted in Fantasy, Fiction, Friday Flash Fics, Friday Flash Fictions, LGBT, Short-Stories | 1 Comment