The town where it's illegal to drink (too much coffee) and drive

There's a town (in my mind, anyway) where you're not supposed to drive with too much, well, blood caffeine. Tish, a driver with a large sense of entitlement and an even larger amount of coffee in her system, finds this out when she's pulled over for speeding.

She also finds out that the law was passed after an angry protest by victims of bureacracy, buzzed on coffee.
Adapted from an image by Myriams-Fotos via Pixabay. Font: Sans Forgetica

Seeing things in a new light

Lina, a widow with wishful tendencies, stars in the next story. I had to make her a widow, because if her husband were alive, she wouldn't be able to stop herself from telling him about the fascinating predictions she's read from some scientist on the Internet. But since he's gone, she's surrounded by younger people -- sons, a daughter-in-law, and a couple of homestay students -- and she knows they'd be skeptical.

Dr. Harcus tells his audience that the earth is about to experience a cosmic event that will boost the quality of its light -- and everyone's quality of life -- permanently.

It's all supposed to happen by the last new moon of the year . . .

(Banner image by geralt, prism by tombud, both at Pixabay.)

Back, with Bristles

Next  . . . (I know it's been a long time between posts; I got dissatisfied with starting everything on Pinterest and automating it onto other platforms. I was also too lazy to do it any other way. Was. I hope.)

Anyway, next in the book is Bristle Babies, the story of  two schoolgirls who have a day off when their parents don't, and who happen to live near a lake reportedly teeming with legendary creatures. It also involves dozens of expired Twinkies.

(Lakeshore photo by tara620, Pixabay.    Twinkies by Evan-Amos, Wikipedia.)
 

Branching out

Kelly's more or less legal ripoffs could also include "fashion garments" like children's party T-shirts . . . Just right for a formal occasion when you have to impress the relatives, right?



Then there's men's fashion.
Two for the price of one, in this case.

 Finally, if Kelly dared (she wouldn't), there is the possibility of the Wedding T-shirt. This one even includes props and a luxury setting. But I thinkprinting this photo on a T-shirt and advertising it with an implication that what you get is the dress would be going too far even for Kelly. It would ruin so many plans and expose her to so many furious brides that it wouldn't be worth it. No, she'd probably stick to cocktail dresses, men's shirts, and kidswear. Like her mother before her, she knows who she wants for customers.

All photos are from Pixabay.

Kelly's "more or less legal" business plan

from xusenru at Pixabay

She figures she'll get some stock photos of elegant high-end clothes, use them to advertise impossibly cheap "fashion garments", and get them printed on T-shirts for anyone careless and naive enough to place an order.

After all, a t-shirt is a "short-sleeved 100% cotton fashion garment." And it would be easier than getting a factory in China to make up an attempt at a knock-off.

From Clard at Pixabay

The model on the right looks a little like Becky Sharp in Thackeray's original illustrations for Vanity Fair.

 

Buying his own work

By Eyre Crow. Source

On a train during a U.S. tour, Thackeray ran into a boy selling books, who (probably unknowingly) offered him copies of his own work. He bought A Shabby Genteel Story and, what's more, read it.

Whether any of the payment ever made its way back to him . . . well, pirated American editions were the curse of British authors.

One of Thackeray's tours of the U.S.

As his "amanuensis and factotum", he took along an artist, Eyre Crow, who drew much of what they saw -- and later wrote a book about it.

Steinway Hall (no relation)

From Wikipedia

This is the original one on 14th Street (no, not Steinway Street or Steinway Village). It and the later halls served as "concert halls, showrooms and sales departments for Steinway & Sons pianos" and became "the center of New York's cultural life."

The crowd is there to buy tickets to a reading by Dickens in 1867. 

More in Wikipedia.

The Manager of Vanity Fair

Thackeray was the only one of the authors I've borrowed from so far who was enough of a visual artist to draw his own portrait, so here it is -- a little ironic, like lots of his work.

Life at Gateshead

Charlotte Brontë by JH Thompson

 We're told Mrs Reed had a "chosen vassalage" -- chosen to fit in with her expectations and preferences. The only one who'd been thrust upon her was Jane Eyre.

 
I was a discord in Gateshead Hall: I was like nobody there; I had nothing in harmony with Mrs. Reed or her children, or her chosen vassalage . . .  a heterogeneous thing, opposed to them in temperament, in capacity, in propensities; a useless thing, incapable of serving their interest . . .

Or maybe she refused to see that her designated role was scapegoat.

What if things had gone just a little differently? What if Dr. Buchmann had interfered once more? 

Timeline (there is none)

Robert Louis Stevenson, whose work is so essential to the Buchmannverse, was of later vintage than the other authors I've drawn from. In fact, he was the reason I seriously considered never writing the first story at all. But it rattled around in my mind, bothering me so much that eventually I threw real time out the window. Dr. B says the 19th century seems "compressed and accelerated", and that's how I'm treating it. Just think of it as Old Timeyness.

(At left is RLS and his wife, Fanny, in the chair, wearing a sari -- portrait by John Singer Sargent.)
 

BTW, I know Stake of Holly isn't free anymore . . .

They only let me give it away five days a month. It's now set at the lowest price possible, 98 cents.

There are more Dr. Buchmann stories coming, and meanwhile there are my other books. Click the covers to see them on Amazon.


 

In honour of Mary Shelley

Because I know I never would've had the creativity (or just plain courage) to think up Dr. "Buchmann" and his backstory all by myself. 

Portrait by Reginald Easton. Said to be painted from her death mask, which is somewhat fitting.