Two Sentimental Gentlemen, by Gabriel Valjan

"Two Sentimental Gentlemen," by Gabriel Valjan, in Blood on the Bayou: Case Closed, edited by Don Bruns, Down and Out, 2025. 

I have a story in this book.

This is the third story by Valjan to grace my blog.

My favorite piece of writing advice from E.B. White is this: Be obscure clearly. This tale is a good demonstration of that principle.

It is New Orleans during Prohibition.  Fawcett and Angel have arrived and are looking for trouble.  Just for starters they are two men checking into a room with one bed, and worse, one of the men is suspiciously dark in color.  (The mayor has a quota, the hotel clerk explains.)  And they deliberately attract the attention of the richest industrialists in the city.

What are they up to?  Well, that's the puzzle, of course, but it isn't what I mean by being obscure clearly. Here we see them entering their hotel room:

The room, dark and carpeted, appeared undisturbed.  There was a large window, curtained, and His and Hers chairs that framed it like brackets.  There was a closet nearest them, a desk next, and the bed with a nightstand to their right.  Another door was ajar, and a dull light illuminated the ceramic tiles in the bathroom, the subway tiles of the wall there, white as Ahab's whale.

See? Nice and clear, with the lovely little metaphor tossed in at the end. But we immediately learn that something unexpected has happened in the room and we won't find out what until much later.  The precision of the description makes it clear that the obscurity that follows is intentional.

A nice historical tale of suspense.

Wax On, Wax Off, by Nina Mansfield

 

"Wax On, Wax Off," by Nina Mansfield, in  Malice Domestic: Mystery Most Humorous, edited by John Betancourt, Michael Bracken, and Carla Coupe, Wildside Press, 2025.

 Hoo-boy.  Not sure what to say about this one.

Mystery story? Check.  Science fiction? Arguably.  Political satire? Undoubtedly.

Our protagonist is "Andrea Kalinski, PTA treasurer, locally known mommy-blogger, and founder of The Ageless Change, a recently launched skin-care line that targeted menopausal women." 

Unfortunately for her the Body Hair Acceptance Movement has moved into power and twenty-eight states have banned "unnatural hair removal for profit."  Mansfield describes the campaign in detail which we need not go into here, although it sounds depressingly realistic.

Andrea is forced to go to an illegal waxing parlor to prepare for her work-and-recreation trip to Brazil, but someone gets killed.  "I hadn't signed up to investigate a murder. I wanted to battle an unjust law and wear a thong at Ipanema Beach."

Funny and thought-provoking. 

Paradise by the Dashboard Light, by C. J. Kudlacz

 "Paradise by the Dashboard Light," by C. J. Kudlacz, in Bat Out of Hell, edited by Don Bruns, 2025.

I listened to an audiobook version of this story, so apologies for any inaccurate quotes. 

Someone said that what an author of fiction is supposed to do is chase the protagonist into a tree and throw rocks at them.  Big tree in this story, tons of rocks. 

 Jacob Mills, age 17, has not had an easy life.  After his father died in the war his mother hit the bottle, moved them to northern Maine, and married an abusive creep named Clint.  Part of Jacob's reaction  to all this earned him a term in juvenile prison.  

Now he's out but this is a specially bad day: 

Ten miles to Canada and Jacob Mills had an empty gas tank, a flat tire, and his stepfather's body in the trunk.

Oh, it's also snowing.   And he's vague about who killed Clint, largely because of his concussion.

 So yeah, bad day.

 But all he has to do is somehow fix the tire without opening the trunk, slip across the border, get to his grandfather's house, and bury the corpse, all without being spotted by the cops who know him all too well.

This is a suspense story that turns out to be about more than suspense.  It's gripping and very clever.

 

 

The Far End of Bourbon Street, by Larry S. Evans II.

 "The Far End of Bourbon Street," by Larry S. Evans II, in Blood on the Bayou: Case Closed, edited by Don Bruns, Down and Out, 2025.

I have a story in this book.

Townsend is a bestselling author of thrillers.  Unfortunately he leads the life he thinks his readers expect which means a lot of drinking and other chicanery.

Allison, his publicist and long-suffering wife, is barely willing to suffer it anymore.  

But everything changes after an event at a New Orleans bookstore/speakeasy, when Town finds himself under arrest for murder.  Did he lose control in a drunken rage, or is he being framed?

The rest of the story appears in short flashes, the way I imagine waking up after a blackout might be.  It is cleverly written and satisfying.

Ash Tuesday, by M.S. Greene

 

"Ash Tuesday," by M.S. Greene, in Malice Domestic: Mystery Most Humorous, edited by John Betancourt, Michael Bracken, and Carla Coupe, Wildside Press, 2025.

My job here is to review  the best mystery story I read each week.  So: what's a mystery story?  Otto Penzler defined it as a story in which crime or the threat of crime is a major element.

By that definition this story doesn't count.  Oh, you could split hairs and point to some laws being broken or bent, but it is hardly the point of the tale.  But this is a story of detection, so I decree that it qualifies.

Trent, Colin, and Ray are roommates and Trent is having troubles. First of all, he is struggling with the LSAT exams. Second, he has an unrequited crush on Ray. And third, there's the corpse on the hall table.

Well, not a corpse exactly.  A box containing a bag of cremated remains. It was mailed to their apartment by persons unknown for reasons unknown.  And so the detection begins.  This is a convoluted tale that seems like it should fall apart in a flurry of coincidences, but Greene connects the dots in a satisfying manner.