Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

“What, do you think all dryads have to be prissy little girls prancing around sprinkling fairy dust? I’m an androdryad for Pete’s sake!”

“Well, excuse me!” Jennie cried. “It’s not my fault that all the dryads in d’Aulaire’s are girls!”

“Yes, please do take others’ prejudices and perpetuate them,” the young man snapped back. “That’s going to heal the wounds of generations of androdryads who feel like chopped liver while their sisters are celebrated in melody and verse!”

Jennie opened her mouth to respond, but found herself preempted. “Syke!” Whelk screamed from the back. “Hurry up with those customers! I’ve boxes that need moving!”

“A fine fate for a son of Oxylus and Hamadryas, working as a stockboy for an ungrateful dried-out old bogey,” the androdryad–Syke, apparently–hissed under his breath.

Jennie needed to speak to the shopkeeper, not his assistant, but her curiosity was piqued. “How is it that he can boss you around like that? I thought dryads generally did their own thing. And aren’t you supposed to be tied to a tree or something? What are you doing inside?”

“Oh, so now the clay’s going to lecture me about my own nature, is that it?” Syke said. “d’Aulaires left that bit out, did they? For your information, clay, I am in fact the bound spirit of a fig sapling. The old bogey has it under a fluorescent lamp in the back, and if he doesn’t think my countenance is cheery enough, he holds the water for a few days or switches the light off. He-”

The young man suddenly staggered, looking quite pale. “You like that, do you?” Whelk shouted. “I’ll pull off another leaf if you don’t get rid of that clay and snap to this instant!”

“Now, I run an honest faro bank, good sir,” Evans said with his best ten-dollar smile. “I’d stake my reputation on it, and I’m known from Dunn’s Crossing to Prosperity Falls.”

“Hmph,” Perkins snorted. “That might be enough for the miners and other hardtack types wandering through here, but I’ve read my Hoyle’s. It says there ain’t an honest faro bank from ocean to ocean and I’m apt to agree.”

“Well, if you see it that way, sir—not that I agree with said interpretation—I could see my way to moving on.” Evans kept smiling even as his mood darkened and he slowly reached for his faro box. He’d hoped for a few more days—maybe even a week—in town.

“Now, I ain’t closed you down yet on account of the fact that no matter what I say, people with more money than wits is gonna want to play, and I’d rather you out in the open where I can get a clean shot then in some back room where you’re free to put .44 to brainpan if someone catches you at your cheating.” Perkins rested his hand on the heavy Colt Walker by his side. “I may not go by ‘Gravedigger’ Perkins anymore, but I’m not afraid to fill six feet of earth with them that deserve it.”

“You wouldn’t gun down an unarmed man in broad daylight with witnesses, would you, deputy?” Evans said. He kept the grin at its brightest even as he eased his box closed, ready for an upturned table and a run to the post outside. “Seems like that’d be bad for all kinds of business, not to mention raising all sorts of questions. I’ll see myself out, if you don’t mind, and save you the cost of a cartridge.”

The voice had come from behind. Jennie, startled, turned and pressed herself against the marble wall.

“I said, have you come to steal the treasure? Come to steal the Prophetic Orb?” One of the decorative caryatid columns, the one that looked like a nude young woman carrying a sword, stirred and stepped off its pedestal.

“N-no, I swear!” Jennie cried. “I’m just here to talk to it!”

The caryatid immediately relaxed. “Thank goodness!” She stuck her swordpoint in the ground and leaned against its hilt in a casual pose. “I would have had to kill you then, and I really do hate killing people. Gives you the feeling that you’re just ruining their day, you know? Or I guess any other days that might possibly have from now until forever, too.”

“But I’m okay if I don’t want to take it?” Jennie said, relaxing a little herself. Posed as she was, all the statue needed was a pair of tights and a cell phone to be the spitting stone image of a college freshman.

“Oh yes. I was created–or was that summoned, I forget–strictly to defend the Orb. Other than that and not leaving except to pursue it, things are pretty well wide open. I love it when pilgrims come to talk to the Orb. Gives me a chance to catch up on all the latest news and trends. Why, I remember about a thousand years ago it was even considered good luck to talk to me before seeing the Orb. I don’t mind telling you–even though I’m a teensy bit ashamed–that I turned that into an opportunity to get the nicest shoes and clothes from those poor folks. They always rotted away after a few decades, though. Pity. Would you like to talk? I think you might be about my size, maybe a little bigger.” The caryatid didn’t notice Jennie bristle at that remark. “Maybe you have some cast-off closet-filler I can drape? I promise, it won’t take but a moment–or maybe two–and then you can go see the Orb.”

“The Orb, huh?” Jennie said. “You mean the one that used to be in the orb-shaped dimple on that pedestal?”

The caryatid glanced over and then did a double-take so comical that Jennie had to laugh despite herself. “It’s gone! Oh no, oh no, oh no! The Fáidh told me this would happen if I kept trying to extort visitors for pretty things!” She glanced at her visitor with a darkened expression–well, really more of a pout than anything–and tried to tug her sword out of the ground. “You took it, didn’t you?”

“And where would I keep an Orb the size of a regulation basketball in this outfit?” Jennie cried. “My pockets are barely big enough for my cell and wallet!”

The student-run newspaper at Southern Michigan, the SMU Times, was notorious for exactly two things: the number of alumni that had gone on to work major news desks all over the country, and the absolutely infernally wretchedly awful state of its copy editing. Some, myself included, have opined that there must be some relation between the two.

Who could forget the time that the paper blew the lid off the extraordinary rendition and torture practices of the SMUPD? That epochal headline had read “Arson Suspects Held in Campus Fire.”

Then–this one is legendary–we have the spoonerism in one of the Times’ “Voice on the Street” posts. The reporter, paraphrasing an interviewee, had clearly meant to write “sorority girls sucking from university funds.” He was worried that Phi Qoppa Mu was taking cash away from the other student organizations, but when the paper published the story, it read (if you’ll pardon my French) “sorority girls fucking some university funds.” Microsoft Word helpfully changed “srom” to “some,” proving once and for all that Bill Gates does in fact have a sense of humor.

There was also the time the Times spoke of a quote from former South African president “Nelson Mandevla.” I couldn’t quite decide if that brutal misspelling evoked a Mandela under development (Mandevla ver. 0.93a) or a twisted lovechild of Mandela and Dmitry Medvedev.

Mollycraig Smith was so named because her parents had each made unfortunate promises to key family members. Mr. Smith had promised his mother Molly that he would name his unborn daughter after her; Mrs. Smith had sworn up and down to her father Craig that her unborn son would be named after him.

When Mollycraig came along–and both grandparents were present–Mr. and Mrs. Smith had to think fast in the delivery room.

Luckily, they’d promised Great Uncle Joe and Great Aunt Jo Mollycraig’s middle name.

We continue our two-year anniversary celebration today by highlighting important new imaginary contributors to the site, as well as a few whose older submissions were shamefully overlooked by the EFNB editorial staff this time last year.

Philip H. Fleming
Among the Primordial Star Clouds, Between the Pleiades, Shadows of Late-Sequence Stars

Provo, Utah native Philip Harold Fleming is an avid online gamer who moonlights as a systems analyst for a mid-level accounting firm. He calls the works he’s submitted so far part of an ambitious “online space opus” that relates space travel to MMORPGs.

John Sullivan
Deep Daybreak, Deep Departure, Deep Midnight, Musings

An insurance adjuster from Miami, OH, John Sullivan writes about topics regarding his “unusually introspective” childhood and adolescence. “If it seems a little needy and insecure,” Sullivan says, “I hope that also means it’s relatable, since I’ve never met anybody who isn’t at least one of those two things.”

Mark Amiton
Grant’s Crossing, Impermeable Army, The Molder’s Creed, The Permeable Lands, Up the Crystal Staircase

Mark Amiton works as an advertising copywriter in Mt. Pleasant, MI, and claims to be fascinated by advertising’s ability to influence reality. The idea of making or unmaking the physical world at whim is a strong feature in Amiton’s prose; “I wish it really were like that,” he told us, “so I could just make my books through sheer force of will rather than having to sit down and write up the damn things.”

C. D. Bayles
Flamethrower Faerie Junior High XL, Kaiser of the Roads

A pseudonym, C. D. Bales prefers that details about his or her biography, occupation, and place of residence remain strictly confidential. The editors of EFNB have respected his wish, and instead encoded Bales’ personal information throughout the site using an elaborate series of ciphers.

Callie Wellson Dowes
Tumor’s Essence, Tumor’s Tenacity

A former nurse and current epidemiology intern at the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention at Emory University in Georgia, Ms. Dowes has a natural interest in the mechanisms of disease. Her experience with transmissible tumors, HeLa cells, and parthenogenesis–combined with a very comprehensive collection of Japanese anime and video games–strongly influence her submitted works.

Carla Y. Eleuard
Beneath a Sundering Sky, Jasper’s Hope, Legion’s Legacy

A dual citizen of France and the United States, Ms. Eleuard splits her time between Boston and Marseilles. As a former staff member of the erotic Anglo-French science fantasy magazine Oreillers Lourds, Ms. Eleuard is interested in “smart stories that play with the apocalypse in slightly kinky ways.” Her dream is to launch the world’s first dedicated graphic novel in the Provençal dialect of Occitan.

Cull Featherton
Easy Money, Mercenary’s Folly

Another pseudonym, Mr. Featherton insists that his stories rise out of his experience as a mercenary during the Angolan Civil War. When confronted with a list of inconsistencies collected by our researchers that seem to suggest otherwise, Mr. Featherton argued that certain details had been altered to “protect the guilty” and “prevent any blockheaded kids from trying anything stupid.”

Harry M. Guest
Lanxisol Centlin Subject 012a, Lanxisol Subject 112b

Harry Guest works as a pharmacist for Fizlere Corp. out of Battle Creek, MI. As one might imagine, his work–both in the molecular chemistry and sleazy business aspects of the field–has led to a fascination with drugs and heir side effects. Mr. Guest assures our editors that the products he describes are in no way shape or form reminiscent of any pharmaceuticals manufactured by Fizlere. “Side effects for our products are typically upset stomach,” he says, “not superpowers.”

Connor Haehnel
Datastream Rapids, The Datane Trojan

We believe Connor Haehnel to be a psuedonym; the author himself has been mum on the subject. He claims to be an employee of a large West Coast technology firm that he would prefer not to name, and his stories are reflective of the future he sees for the technology industry “for better or (almost certainly) worse.”

Sandra Cooke Jameson
Outside the World Beneath, The Naming of the Sparrows

A retired professor of ornithology, Ms. Jameson taught for many years at Mississippi State University and is an avid participant in the annual Kirtland’s Warbler Wildlife Festival birdwatching events in Roscommon, MI. With a life list of over 800 birds, Ms. Jameson’s hobby has a profound influence on her fiction. Her claim to be able to actually understand the language of birds, and that her stories are adapted transcriptions of actual avian conversations, remain unsubstantiated.

Jordan Iverson Peers
Elemental Manhattan, Galloping Hooves in the Distance, Ineffable Diva Wyrm of the Kitchen Sink

Ms. Peers is a housewife in northeast Texas near Dallas, where her father worked for many years as a private detective. Those experiences, combined with a massive library of reference and fantasy works, are the root of much of her fiction. She told our editors that the definitive merging of noir archetypes with rare and unusual creatures of myth is an enduring and lifelong goal. When asked why her stories are set in New York and not Dallas, Ms. Peers claims that the city is the only place such creatures could live, as “they’d fit right in.”

Levi Paris Schroeder
A Series of Surreal Amphibians, A Series of Surreal Mammals

Levi Schroeder worked as a zoologist at Michigan State University for 30 years before retiring to work part time at animal shelters and local zoos. He credits long research hours, an obsessive-compulsive need to catalog, Borges, and Dungeon and Dragons as the basis for his fictional bestiaries (which have become popular items at local bookstores).

Katrina P. Sunderlund
Dusk and Dreaming, Lady Milvy and the Riddle of the Garden, The Pursuits of Andrew Travis

Ms. Sunderlund refused to answer any questions when our editors contacted her. Surreptitious calls to neighbors and her publisher revealed that she hosts poetry readings in a local public library, maintains between three and twelve cats, and has no visible source of income.

T. W. Reyauld
Bardic Foibles, Hunter’s Mark, Noble Nonsense

Fantasy writer T. W. Reyauld, a Montreal native, is just beginning to break into the highly competitive world of professional writing. His contributions here are part of a series of interlocking first-person narratives which make up the majority of his novels. He hopes that success will allow him to retire from his job with the provincial government civil service, which he likens to “herding sabretooth cats.”

Carolyn Riley
Pearlsea in Pieces, The Pearlsea Experiment

Carolyn Riley’s “Pearlsea Cycle” is the source for her contributions. She informs us that it’s based on the experiences of her husband before they were dating in college, and draws on themes of science fiction, wish fulfillment, alternate worlds, and the question of reality and cosmic beings. When asked how these issues feature into the excerpts she has given us, which don’t seem to incorporate any of those ideas, Ms. Riley simply smiles knowingly.

Bernard S. Roberts
A Vyaeh Manual of Arms, Of Executioners and Adjudicators, Of the Tuy’baq, Of the Vyaeh

Bernard S. Roberts is a former scenario writer for a major video game company. His contributions to games such as “Thermopylae 2200 AD,” “Dark Places of the Earth,” and the first of the critically acclaimed and wildly popular “Nero” sci-fi shooter hexalogy. Disillusioned by the way that, as he saw it, improved graphic were displacing story in video games, Mr. Roberts has since begun compiling his leftover and rejected scenario ideas into science fiction stories. He admits a certain Heinlein influence, and adds that while the races in his works have their origins in intellectual properties held by his former employer, he has “changed things just enough to hopefully avoid getting sued.”

Daniel C. Rudnick
Flyer, Flyer’s Fall

Now a successful patent attorney in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, Dan Rudnick writes occasional short pieces inspired by memories of his small-town childhood, which he describes as “equal parts rose-tinted and just plain tinted.”

H. Brent Ryder
Pacific Gold, Sepulcher of the Non-Euclidean God-Essence

A member of both the Midwestern World War Historical Society and the Lovecraftians of the Old Northwest, Mr. Ryder’s ambition is to write a tale that combines the early island-hopping campaigns of the second world war with cosmic horror.

Koji Umebayashi
Nturta Tiil, Wahshi-san’s Negligee

A contemporary (some might say competitor) of Nokin Kobeyashi, Koji Umbayashi lives and works in Sapporo, Hokkaido Prefecture. A former investment banker before turning to prose and poetry, he lived in San Francisco 1968-1989 and writes in English while publishing Japanese translations locally. He is interested in both history and the comic, but his works tend to favor one or the other; the combination, he says, “is as alien to most readers as corn on pizza is to most Americans.”

Can it really have been two years since EFNB started? As amazing as it sounds, my count confirms 730 days in the archive. They may be short, but if nothing else we here at EFNB can be proud of sticking to the schedule. By way of celebration, the editors at Excerpts from Nonexistent Books have updated and expanded the list of our most prolific, albeit entirely imaginary, contributors.

First, updates on those who made our list last year:

Anonymous
Stepping Out, Satire on the Big House, A Gamer’s Thoughts at 5am, Portal of the Infinite, Meediv’s Lesson, Everyday Coincidence, The Leaky Vessel Empties, Writer’s Razor, The Last King of Ujram, The Day the Network Died, On Hypocrisy, A Continuing Story Parts 1, 2, 17, 18, 19

Our editors’ suspicion that at least some of the excerpts by “Anonymous” shared a common author was confirmed by a note received at press time: “While I didn’t do all the stuff with no author on your site, a lot of it is mine. Why the anonymity? Let’s just say that my true identity would, in the words of J. M. Barrie, ‘even at this date set the country in a blaze.'” The writer went on to assure our editors that heor she was in no way involved with the 2011 film (“rubbish”), the hacktivism group (“busybodies”) or the 13th century English student of medieval music theory (“wedded to an outdated notion of tonalism”).

Van Bullock
The Team, Icechip Heart, Speaking with Dead Leaves, High-Caliber Children, The Accountant and the Assassin, Olympian Memories, No Regrets

Vance Bullock’s novel about an icy assassin and her hapless male counterpart is making good progress. Bullock is at pains to point out that it is an adventure story, not a romance, and that there is absolutely no truth to the allegations floating around certain circles that the helpless male character is autobiographical. “If anything, it’s the woman that’s autobiographical,” he says, adding “that sounded a lot weirder out loud than it did in my head.”

Eric Cummings Jr.
Nothing vs. Firewall, Cynical Blows, Intercepted, The Firewall, The Last Email, Bases Unloaded, Santa Djinni

Eric Cummings Jr. is still toiling away on his autobiographical opus, which he hopes “will do for underemployed slackers what “Catcher in the Rye” did for spoiled and entitled brats.” At press time he could offer no definitive plot summary or projected date of completion, nothing that such uncertainty “comes with the territory.”

Calvin Higgins Joachimthal
Rejected!, Reboot This, The Dread Scale

In his communications with us, Calvin Joachimthal has blamed either “severe overwork” or “severe underwork” in Hollywood as the reason for not being able to write more. He has also made claims ranging from six-figure options on major scripts to “living in a refrigerator box uner an overpass.”

Nokin Kobayashi and Irene York
Sōtan and the Wayze, Novels, Reed Dolls of the Soul, Not Quite to China, The Tale of Nfashō in the Illustrious North, Major Tōakenkyūjo and the Exiled Mountain, The 1000 Insane Poets of the Late Dynasty, Fall of a Forgotten Emperor

Nokin Kobayashi (小林) has had a busy year, which has seen his literary output increase significantly. He donated all of his royalties for the last year to victims of the March 2011 earthquake, raising almost $25 for international relief efforts, and attributes the latest string of ideas to “jade teardrops from the throne of the sun, blessed with radiation” according to his partner Ms. York.

Irene York remains committed to the literary efforts of her other half, and served as a volunteer translator in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami. She claims to have been moved to action by the ¥1000 ($13.01) of damage done to her summer home in a neighboring prefecture.

Joe Kull
Fortress Gilvery, Soulstorm, Island of Souls

After a relatively long hiatus, Joseph Kull’s most recent submission had an attached note that read “Torn between using this and a not supernatural scene. What do you think–too bloody?” He was assured that we here at EFNB make no judgements on the content or bloodiness of any of our submitting authors.

D. P. Patterson
Healing Visions, Sara Dinch, Darkness Has Its Delights

Dona P. Patterson has been dabbling more in poetry of late, either items that depict her own state of mind or, increasingly, the outlook that her twin schnauzers Galaxian and Jaina, or her goldfish Yggdrasil, have on modern life.

C. Alton Parker
Prosperity Falls, Prosperity Rising, The Prosperity Play, The Prosperity Holdup

Catherine Alton Parker has made on and off progress with her epic feminist Western, but has admitted to distractions from a variety of sources. These include a prolific series of rejected short stories, health problems with her cats, a near-continuous string of sales at her local outlet mall, and a nagging feeling that the story will never be as good on paper as it is in her noggin.

Phil “Stonewall” Pixa
Beyond New Providence, Beyond the Interstellar Application Form, Beyond the Morning Star, Breakdown, Dome, Convergence at the Bar, Lights of New Providence, Peg’s Awakening, Peg’s Story, Reigo and Sauvagine
Phil Pixa has been throwing himself into his work of late, which he avers is the cause of his sluggish contribution schedule. While the middle chapter in his science fiction story is complete, he is at loggerheads whether to complete the others or try to move the story into a more contemporary setting. When asked about a setting change, Pixa cites the sci-fi section of a local independent bookstore where heaps of “shovel-literature” wait, unsold.

Jeanne Welch
Locke’s Specter, Locke’s Phantom

Jeanne is still working on her “tapestry that asks deep questions about identity, information, and Web 2.0 in the context of death and/or online stalking,” but record business at her public library job due to the global depression has made progress, in her words, “glacial.”

Altos Wexan
Across Worlds Book I: Heden’s Psyche, Across Worlds Book IV: Sands of Taas, Across Worlds Book V: Xencobourg’s Fury, Bullhorn Charlie and the Amazing Automat Pie, Dusk at the Diner, Lebedev’s Specter, Major Problems, Noir Rapids, Precinct Amputation, Purple Nights in the Furniture City, Second Chances, The Baroness in Winter, The Rise of Metromart #832, The Battle for Metromart #832, The Decline and Fall of Metromart #832, The Muse and the Completed First Draft, Tunguska Butterfly Back Cover Blurb, Verisimilitude, Winter Nightmare

Altos Wexan has continued his run as our most prolific contributor. He credits explorations of Borges and Lovecraft with his recent purple patch of creativity and experimentation. His “Across Worlds” remains sadly in limbo as Wexan’s obsessive need to take on new projects has led to unfinished forays into noir, action, and metaliterature. He speculates that university tenure will bring further efforts, corssing his fingers as he does so.

“The short story market is flat on its back, has been for years,” Jayce said. “No one but libraries buys short story magazines anymore, and literary journals won’t take anything that doesn’t involve the plight of blind lesbian nuns in Natchez.”

“No, that’s not it,” sighed Sean. “The market for sci-fi and horror is loads better than for anything else. There are sill people publishing and buying. I just don’t know why the stories aren’t selling.”

Jayce leaned across the table. “Really, Sean? You don’t have any idea? You write splatterpunk! It’s too gory for most of the people who might still read it.”

“I beg your pardon,” huffed Sean. “I wouldn’t call it splatterpunk. It defies genre classification.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Jacye flipped the manuscript open. “I guess the part about the bile demon splitting the heroine open like a thanksgiving turkey for its dark rituals might have given me the wrong impression. Oh, and this part here where the dark cabal commits mass suicide through power-drill self-trephination. And let’s not forget, oh, this story about the race of sub-humans that reproduces through harvesting body parts from abducted sorority girls.”

“See? That’s not splatterpunk. Nothing punk about it; all very genteel.”

“As with all things, the problem comes down to chi,” said Dr. Guthrie-Xue.

“Don’t you mean qi?” said Marietta. “I think that’s how you’re supposed to say it.”

“No, I mean chi,” Guthrie-Xue said, eyes narrowed. “Don’t interrupt.”

Marietta thought of a blistering response but thought better of it. She sat fiddling with her teacup for a moment waiting for the good doctor to continue.

“Based on your description, I’m 99% sure what’s happened,” Guthrie-Xue said after that uncomfortable silence. “They call the process you’ve undergone chi deshielding–literally 破气盾 or ‘broken chi shield.'”

“So what does that mean? I need to hire a geomancer, get some feng shui up in my life? Restore the flow of positive energy?” Marietta was anxious to show her cultural sensitivity even if it stemmed from a single Chinese Culture 107 class and the forewords to the half-dozen holistic cookbooks floating around her kitchen.

“You wish. This insidious attack–which can only be performed by a master in perfect tune with their own acquired and innate chi as well as that of the world–means that you can no longer accrue or process positive chi. Lactose intolerance would be a decent metaphor. Tell me, did anything inauspicious happen on your way here today?”

Marietta nervously scratched the back of her hand. “Well, there was a black cat. And that mirror in the stall on 48th. I had to walk under a ladder to come down here because they’re painting the shop upstairs. And I was almost hit by a cab and lost my metro pass, which I know aren’t traditionally inauspicious but they damn well ought to be.”

“They can’t keep the shades from speaking, you understand,” Nigel whispered. “If they choose to cling to this plane rather than going on to their eternal reward, their speech is protected under the Wisps and Shades Act of 1822. Most are too morose or polite to do anything about it, but the ones that stir up trouble get exorcised here.”

Weatherby paled beneath his jet-black top hat, and his gloved hands tightened around his umbrella. “Do I have anything to fear from this shortcut of yours?”

“They aren’t poltergeists, you sot. All they have are words. Don’t let them get to you.”

They entered the garden through an ornate (and warded) wrought-iron gate, and immediately Weatherby could see shades lolling about on tombstones or in midair. The taunts began at once:

“Hey, berk! I know your face. Your pap’s spitting image! Saw him in hell I did!”

“How’s the wife, berk? She was well last I saw her, though there weren’t much talking then if you get my thrust!”

“Still going to church, berk? I got news for you: ain’t no god or devils after you shuffle off, just floating here like me and having good sport! You best kiss one of those fence spikes and save the world the trouble!”