The Leg & Other Stories

by David J. Keffer

Description: "The Leg & Other Stories" collects thirteen stories by David J. Keffer. Dating from 1991 to 2013, the stories were written in the following four cities: Gainesville, Florida, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Washington, DC, and Knoxville, Tennessee. These twenty-two years include his time as an undergraduate at the University of Florida, a graduate student at the University of Minnesota, a post-doctoral fellow at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory and a professor at the University of Tennessee. Over the course of this span, one can observe both constant themes in the writing, already established as a young man, and the development of voice and technique. During these two decades the author wrote many more stories than what are collected here, most of which presumably shall never see the light of day. The baker's dozen of stories that are collected here were selected by the author's own hand for a variety of reasons, some of which have to do with the merit of the story themselves, some based on a personal fondness and others due to ambiguous, extraneous criteria. To be sure, several beloved stories were left on the cutting room floor.

Original cover, rejected by the courteous staff of createspace.com in order to rescue the Poison Pie Publishing House from a potential "bad customer experience".

From the title piece, "The Leg" to "Brain vs Mouth & Co., an interview in twenty-five parts", we are presented with stories by which the author tried to make sense of the world, as it was presented to him, and to formulate an appropriate response to it. That someone should attempt again and again over the course of decades to answer the same question in what appears to be unrelated ways is a clear indication of the author's inability to escape the question and his equal failure to provide a satisfactory answer.

A note on the peculiar pricing: The author requested that this book be sold for a preposterously high price to discourage anyone from purchasing it. One may wonder at the motivation of an author behind such a request, but whatever consternation such a perverse behavior triggers, it pales in comparison to the reaction one may have in response to the publisher acquiescing to the request.

The stories included in this volume are

• The Leg: An Ambiguous Allegory (2013)
• Notes from the Margin Between the World of the Living and the World of the Dead (2007)
• Mostafa and the Unfathomable Riddle (2004)
• The Boarding House (2000)
• Weird Beings (2000)
• Roy Poonawala, King of Chicago (2000)
• Gainesville, 1988 (2000)
• The Ridiculously Sad Sasquatch (1998)
• Curiosity, Imagination, Devotion (1997)
• Brain vs. Mouth & Co.: an interview in 25 parts (1995-6)
• Ducati (1994)
• Pancake Day Festival Queen (1993)
• Gruff (1991)

The full text of the short story, The Leg: An Ambiguous Allegory is available from the Poison Pie Publishing House via free, anonymous download.

length: 77,000 words (200 pages in paperback)
paperback size: 6 in x 9 in
paperback publication date: July 7, 2016
paperback ISBN-13: 978-1517719401
paperback ISBN: 1517719402
ebook publication date: TBD
ebook ISBN-13: TBD
poison pie publishing house catalog number: PP-032-S