“Always have papers in your hand, walk fast, and look worried. Fewer people bother you.” Interestingly and funnily enough, I experienced this at a job I once had, though we used a clipboard, not papers. Even funnier is the whimsical nonsense in Average Civil Employee:...

Conniption Creek by Earl L Carlson tells the story of the unfortunate residents of Conniption City, a town built in a valley that functions like a "topographical Venus flytrap." The village was founded by swindlers who lured prospectors with fake gold, leaving only the feckless...

In Hans Brunner’s Forever Day, Felix Joseph–Maria Fuchs leaves his family’s Swiss hotel and boards a liner bound for Australia, expecting a season abroad yet encountering a decision that will not release him. On the voyage, he meets Janine, a schoolteacher returning to Victoria, and...

Cody Redman’s life has gone sideways in ways that feel both absurd and painfully familiar in Rod Drought’s Phoenix Rising, Lemuria Down. Once a viral YouTube star, Cody is now scraping by with his roommate, living in a tiny apartment filled with takeout boxes. Everything...

The real life of an airline pilot is often far removed from the public image of a glamorous superhero. Vesa Turpeinen suggests that most of the time they are just human, but sketches an unconventional and highly amusing scenario in FunkyPilot Journals. The author describes...

When a spacecraft lands at the Washington Fairgrounds, Rosaline Browning discovers gray aliens standing inside her bakery, humming at her display case and the muffins they've been eating in Baker's Dozen by Nathan Lee Trautenberg. News of the landing spreads quickly, drawing Eugene Schumaker, whose...

Colm O'Connor's Ballyloo's Finest: A Tale of Chaos and Charm is a delightful, eccentric journey into the fictional Irish village of Ballyloo, where chaos reigns. The story centers on Guard Ollie Berry, a well-meaning but often hapless officer tasked with maintaining order in a town...

In Sicko, Avril Grady tells the story of Jamie Katz, a queer man working as a scriptwriter for an adult film studio. Jamie’s life is complicated—he’s still intertwined with Paul, his twice-ex-husband who is also his boss and secret lover, and their repeated breakups and...

Jane Dougherty did not expect housesitting for her cousin, Elizabeth, to go awry in Two Hours To Bedlam, a Route 66 Mystery by J.G. Macdonald. Yet, she finds herself in a mystery far deeper than expected. When a body is discovered in a sulfur pond,...

Loner-Style Justice, a novella by Mike Marsbergen in the style of screwball comedy, hits all the right spots in delivering a great story. Joseph Tugger is an unusually big but gentle guy whose mission in life is to solve problems, especially the ones where he...