Twelve WOW Short Stories (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780999888476)

Unforgettable highlights in my life impacted the medley of WOW short stories. NASA's Moon Lander mission is but one of the pinnacles. For starters, I served my country during the Korean War. After fighting ceased, my unit shipped to Japan where a legendary thug roamed streets in the darkest nights. The Phantom of Sasebo mystery covers my exploits. College was the next step. The head of the English Department heaped praise on my fertile imagination and urged me to become a writer. Instead, I opted for a degree in math. Once again in the real world, I helped NASA with their death defying space craft projects. Remember when the Moon Lander's takeoff back to earth was temporarily botched? The rocket engine refused to start. I had inspected and given my approval to the switch that wouldn't tum on. Imagine how I felt at the time. Fortunately, it wasn't a faulty part. The rocket engine didn't fire up due to an easily fixed loose wire. Problem solved and the astronauts returned home safely- PHEW! The Moon Lander project made me think about space travel and a slog into the future, as a writer of course. These ideas resulted in two tongue-incheek sci-fi short stories, The Beginning and Ziggy Twinkledust & Venus. Moving on, I worked as a plant statistician and designed experiments to pinpoint problems for befuddled engineers. The conundrums were mostly caused by complex process interactions and were typically unpredictable, much like the bulk of my short story endings. I got the idea from the experiments. Murder Knocks Twice and The Peanut Butter Sandwich Caper are two prime examples and not what you would expect to find in narrative wrap-ups. Bottom line: This WOW medley of twelve stories is not only based on highlights from the past and extrapolations into the future but also fictitious musings in the present. Look hard and you'll spot a few daubs of dry humor as well. By the way, that Phantom of Sasebo guy scared the crap out of me.