Eugenia and the Forest

Eugenia and the Forest
An Illustrated Story
by David J. Keffer and Lynn N. Keffer

Short Description: When Eugenia was a child, she was sent to spend the summer with her three uncles in the forests of East Tennessee. There she first made the acquaintance of Poison Pie, Man of the Mushroom People. He took her under his tutelage and began to instruct her in the arts of sorcery. This illustrated story for children and adventurous adults describes Eugenia’s summer in Tennessee and her first great magic.

Extended Description: Eugenia and the Forest is one of several illustrated stories that featured Poison Pie and was written between 1998 and 2012 (the time of this writing). A fuller discussion of these stories can be found here. All of these stories provide different information about Poison Pie. This particular story reveals one version of his initial meeting with Eugenia, who was in later years to become the greatest sorceress of her age. To be sure, this is not the only existing version of the story of their first meeting. It has been said before that Poison Pie encouraged ambiguity, perhaps even thrived on a strict diet of ambiguity. That there were multiple conflicting stories regarding him was a state of affairs in which he delighted and in which he may have even had a hand in creating.

All of these illustrated stories about Poison Pie (as well as many others) are available for reading in their entirety on the website of the Poison Pie Publishing House. Of the many illustrated stories in which Poison Pie appears, most are not available in paperback form. The Poison Pie Publishing House opted to release Eugenia and the Forest in paperback form for the explicit reason that it is included as part of Chapter 16. Poison Pie vs. Hansel & Gretel in the novel, The Horties. In 2012, when the Poison Pie Publishing House chose to publish The Horties, it was using CreateSpace.com to provide a "print on demand" service for distribution of the paperback novel. This service was not able to print a set of "color plates" in the midst of a book of otherwise black and white text. Therefore, the most economical solution was to provide readers of The Horties access to Eugenia and the Forest either through a link to the webpage or to a paperback version of the story, according to the reader's preference. For this reason alone, Eugenia and the Forest appears as a stand alone illustrated story. (The ebook version of The Horties contains Eugenia and the Forest.)

Written in 2000, this illustrated story is dedicated to Lynn N. Ochs. Published in 2012, this illustrated story is credited to the authors David J. Keffer and Lynn N. Keffer. It is probably clear that sometime in the intervening years, David Keffer and Lynn Ochs were married and she took his last name as her own. If one wonders how a book can be dedicated to one of the co-authors, it should be pointed out that David wrote the story, took the photographs, and put together a fair portion of the artwork. At the point where his artistic skills proved inadequate to finishing the task and where Lynn stepped in and provided the remaining artwork, the intention of dedicating the book to the woman who would later become his wife had already been set in stone.

Sample Images:


Length: 34 pages containing 32 original artworks
paperback size: 8.25 in x 6 in
paperback publication date: November 12, 2012
paperback ISBN-13: 978-1480223363
paperback ISBN: 1480223360
poison pie publishing house catalog number: PP-007-I

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