John Clark, happy to talk about a new anthology coming out on October 22. Dark Maine contains 21 tales, some new, others having appeared in anthologies over the past twenty years or so. Unlike Hardscrabble Kids which came out last year, these are definitely not for children or the faint of heart.

I’ve allowed the darker portion of my humor and imagination to roam free in the creation of these tales. Sandy Emerson probable arrested a number of folks during his career that resemble characters in these stories. Here’s the line-up

In Your Dreams

Posh Digs

With Great Relish

Bad Example

Lady Be Good to Me

Living Up To My Name

Tower Mountain

Fed Up

Knee Socks

In A Town Most Forgotten

Dead Letter Office

My Toes

Love Your Veggies

Martin Gets It

The Unexpected Gift

Snuff Bunny

A New Wrinkle

Not So Neighborly

The Smell Never Leaves

Just Passing Through

The Man In The Glass

Schoolyard Bullies

Perfect Choice

Getting Even

Backup Plan

In them you’ll meet a couple characters whose traumatic brain injuries erased their consciences with interesting results, a girl returning to a dying town to confront her abusive father, and a ghost who hitchhikes. In others, you’ll meet a group of hardscrabble townspeople who mete out justice when one of them gets greedy. In another a greedy lawyer gets his comeuppance at a Thanksgiving dinner, while another man whose retirement tranquility is destroyed by neighbors with a rogue turkey.

Read on and you’ll meet a man working in a most unusual office in a small Maine town, a recovering alcoholic who is held prisoner by a recurring dream, a wealthy woman whose gardening obsessions cause problems, a college graduate tormented by a rogue cop who gets a most satisfying revenge years later, a domestic abuser whose punishment is the perfect antidote, a desperate charter boat operator who cuts a very unique deal, a high school student whose cousin steals his science experiment with disastrous results, and what happens after a rural tannery goes bankrupt and is reopened by new owners.

I make no apologies for any mayhem happening in these tales. They’re representative of the darkness that lurks in my head, and, I suspect in the minds of many writers. Come next spring, if this book has any success, I’ll publish another which I’m calling Sometimes Dark, Sometimes Light, Always Maine.