Magic

The Gambling Game

Pop Lit Fiction

OUR LAST featured story was about chess. With our new feature we’re staying on the theme of strategy and challenge, with Alan Swyer’s “Shut Up and Deal,” an examination of the machinations behind high-level poker playing. It’s a story about protege and mentor. About novice and knowledge. About learning a skill in the face of mind games and chaos. In other words, it’s a metaphor for life!

Written in a fast “pop” style, the story matches the speed of the game– and the hyperbolic process a student must undergo to be a success. We hope you enjoy it!

Radiating old money, the card room was a world which few civilians ever got to experience. Yet in the midst of captains of industry and scions of prominent families sat Eddie, who was seemed to be regarded as somehow less than human.

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(Art: “The Card Players” by Theo van Doesburg.)

 

Sweet Spring

Pop Lit Fiction

We’re near the end of spring– early enough for cool summer reading as heat descends upon the landscape.

Questions: Are there forces in the universe beyond our understanding? Does a talisman actually work?

These questions are asked in our new story, “Sweet Spring” by Scott Cannon, one of our favorite writers. If you want an enjoyable read, this is it!

It was dark within, but I thought I saw something pale in the heart of it. I was shoulder deep in the roots when I heard you ask if I found anything. My hand closed on something cool and smooth, and I drew it out.
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(Painting: “Springtime in Giverny” by Claude Monet.)

Magic

Third-Way Fiction

We’ve got a zinger for you this morning folks, Alan Swyer takes us behind the scenes in the glamorous, duplicitous world of Stage Magicians! Not all is as it seems in Magic.

 

Brought in as a consultant because of his experience unmasking charlatans and debunking cons, the man known to the world as Roger the Remarkable – and to his friends simply as Roger Barnes – came up with rules and guidelines that were swiftly adopted by scores of corporations, then embraced by law enforcement agencies far and wide.

A compilation of old adages: If something seems too good to be true, it probably is; pearls of wisdom: When given a specific name at a company as a reference, check instead with someone else in that person’s department; and fresh takes: Cynicism is man’s foremost line of defense; it listed ten key points for fiscal survival. The most important? Haste not only makes waste, it also breeds disaster!