Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

Heard a spell or seen an incantation that you just can’t place? Use Gaggle’s Reverse Mage search!

Simply type in any material components, verbal incantations, or physical gestures, and upload an optional photograph of the spell being cast or in effect. Gaggle’s Reverse Mage search will then do its best to find you the source of the spell in question!

In many cases, Gaggle can provide you with the spell’s name, the mage that created it, noteworthy masters of the spell, and of course, whether or not it is still under copyright.

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Max had left his hive plenty of honey to survive the winter. Ever since he’d taken up beekeeping in his backyard, he’d been very careful to leave his collaborators enough to live on. They happily made more than they needed, and he happily enjoyed the fruits of their labor as gently as he could, proudly presenting full-comb honey in mason jars as gifts to friends and leaving them as tips at bars.

But when he had checked the hive after the cold snap, Max had found the colony dead to a one, frozen to death huddled in a corner. It had been the worst cold in five years, ten to twenty degrees below zero and twenty to thirty degrees colder than usual. But they’d had plenty of honey, because he’d left it to them. Max’s bees had died less than a foot away from their own amber salvation.

There were plenty of bee sites online that detailed how this could happen; Max read about how the slowly moving mass of bees could accidentally move away from its food source and starve. But still, he blamed himself, and regretted not checking the hive more frequently.

Initially, he had planned to empty the hive out and start anew with more bees, but instead the dead frame sat in the bed of his truck for weeks–a constant rear-view reminder of Max’s sad loss.

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We called it Nuthatch Corners
Not because it had a name
But driving by, over warm summers
Windows down, we would hear them
Squeaking from the pines, joyous
They clearcut the corners, one by one
Pines felled, stacked, trucked
I hope the birds were wise enough
To flee, to fly, as their nests were
Felled one by one, to make way for
Scarred red earth, naked clay
Leveled and graded for condos

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Called the Faceless Woman by some and the Faceless One by others who were unconvinced of its gender, the specter supposedly haunted the upper levels of the Grand Hotel from May to August every year. It supposedly would not cross the brass line in the ground next to room 397 which demarcated where the old and new buildings were joined in 1922, and was never seen on the first or second floors.

Descriptions very but most give a description similar to the Brown Lady of Raynham Hall: a vaporous apparition, internally luminous, with no discernible facial features. Sources differ on whether there is a simple void, flayed muscle, or a bare skull in place of the Woman’s face, but all agree that something is out of the ordinary there, in so much as anything regarding a ghost can be said to be ordinary.

The earliest sightings were reported in local newspapers in 1882, while the number and frequency of sightings increased exponentially after a team from Architecture Monthly captured a portrait of what they believe to have been the Faceless Woman while documenting the Grand Hotel before its renovations.

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“It’s a mummified chipmunk, by the look of it.”

“I didn’t ask what it was, I asked how it got here. It’s been raining for weeks, so how could a chipmunk have gotten desiccated enough to be mummified?”

“Maybe it crawled in someplace relatively dry and died?”

“Surely it would have just rotted. And how does it end up on the sidewalk in that scenario?”

“You’re devoting an awful lot of thought to a dead rodent.”

“Doesn’t the mystery tantalize you?”

“Not any more than your typical dead rodent.”

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Silphium – A spice with a million and one uses around the home or forum, Silphium couldn’t be cultivated and was driven to extinction from wild harvesting.

Scutterbotch – A sweet syrup made from the liquor of the same name, brewed in monastic communities in the Hebrides. The technique for making the liquor, and thus the syrup, was lost during the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

Angelbreath – A bright fruit with a citrussy taste once found on the Andaman Islands. Overharvested for use as an anti-scurvy agent, and may have required a now-extinct bird to spread its seeds.

Mare’s Hope An herb, described as being vaguely peppery, that grew in the Płotznyy Hills region. Over-grazing in the area led to its extinction, as livestock would preferentially seek it out.

Marrowood A tree with interior sap like maple that could be boiled into a sweet substance.The tree, never widespread, became extinct due to land clearing for agriculture.

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Whenever the ground was nice and soft from recent rains or high humidity, that’s when Deborah’s metal detector came out.

She’d generally run the thing–a 13-year-old MinenPlatzen 3200 that had been top of the line once upon a time–over the side yard before heading off to the park. She’d always dress well, in the same sort of clothes she’d wear to church on Wednesday–not Sunday, she wasn’t crazy enough to dig in the dirt in that!–just to reassure folks that she wasn’t some weird bum. Not like those hoboes she saw in Florida at her half-sister’s place on the beach, heavens no. Still got some odd looks, but it was worth it for the thrill of the hunt.

Alcorn Park was frequented by college students, and they frequently lost things there. Rings, earrings, bits of jewelry, and plenty of coins. Bottlecaps too, from late nights drinking under cover of darkness. Deborah had done the same in her student days, after all. She turned in anything that was personalized or seemed sentimental, like the class ring from that young man who’d written her the nice thank-you note, disposed of the trash, and turned the remainder in across town at a cash-for-gold shop run by an old sorority sister.

The money was nothing to write home about, a few dollars a week on average that went into the snack fund. But detecting was fun, even when she found nothing. And, more importantly, it got Deborah out of the house–away from the infernal whine of Kenneth’s TV programs. Ever since he retired, that’s all he’d done, and as much as Deborah couldn’t stand him when she only had to do so nights and weekends, being in the house for any length of time when he was there 24/7 was enough to give digging through wormy dirt for bottlecaps a certain allure.

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NARRATOR: Owlingo is the first language learning software to harness the power of owls and the power of ridicule to help you learn a new tongue, guaranteed!

NARRATOR: Just watch this unscripted interaction between a Spanish language learner and Owlingo, the Judgmental Owl.

STUDENT: Uh, mee madray eh-stay mu-ee may-lo?

OWLINGUO: Ay, tu español es muy malo, y de español de tu madre también. ¡El burro sabe mas que tu!

STUDENT: What’s that about my mom?

OWLINGUO: En español.¡Habla español! Ay, eres tan tonto que hiciste llorar a una cebolla.

STUDENT: Uh…umm…qwee digest-ee dee mee mad-dre?

OWLINGUO: ¡Tu español es tan malo como tu inglés! La mona aunque se vista de seda, mona se queda. ¡Escupo a tu madre!

NARRATOR: Owlingo. Because the best way to learn another language is being insulted in that language by an owl.

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Feral Hog (16 December-14 January)
You’re not some fat domesticated pig: you’re feral, dangerous, wild. Your smarts plus your savagery make you a dangerous combination, and if anyone thinks you’re soft, you’ll show them just how wrong they are.

Housefly (15 January-14 February)
There’s a lot of buzz around you, and even though you can be a bit fragile, it takes a lot to put you down. You can nimbly avoid most of life’s challenges, but when something does hit you, it hits you hard.

Cane Toad (15 February–14 March)
Invasive and toxic, you poison anything that tries to hurt you and go right bak to your business. But this also means you have an even keel, never let things upset you, and go with the flow.

House Sparrow (15 March–14 April)
You’re outgoing, you like being social and having a lot of friends, and you’re not above begging for what you want. But at the end of the day, you’ll be laughing from a high perch with hundreds of family and friends while those who try to keep you down slink away.

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Cockroach (16 August-15 September)
When the radioactive clouds dissipate, you will inherit the earth. A natural survivor, it’s not always pretty but you always get the job done. You prefer darkness to light, being a bit of a night owl, and flight to fighting, but it is also nigh-impossible to keep you out.

Coyote (16 September-15 October)
You’re loyal to your pack and fierce in protecting what’s yours, but you’re also not above a little play. You can be dangerous, but you can be fun as well. Anyone who doubts your ability to fight hard is in for a rude awakening.

Pigeon (16 October-16 November)
You’re equally at home alone or in groups, and your innocuous demeanor puts people at ease. But make no mistake: you are a survivor and you will persevere. Your nest may only be a handful of sticks, but you’ll make it with pride and lay eggs until you can’t lay anymore.

Rat (17 November-15 December)
If it can be eaten you’ll eat it, if it can be drunk you’ll drink it, and if it can be squirmed into, you’ll squirm into it. But for all that you’re loyal, intelligent, community-focused, and probably too much trouble to kill.

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