Bobby's Troll is now available on Kindle. It's a collection of short stories for middle readers and, frankly, is one of my favorites. Here's the back cover copy:

What would YOU do if a troll not only moved in under your bed, but also started charging you a toll to go to sleep?

How would YOU handle a dragon that followed you home from school one day, just itching to be your new family pet?

What YOU would say to a bunch of tooth fairies that poked you awake at the crack of dawn, looking for a loan?

Find out how Bobby, Morgan, Vivienne, and a bunch of other average kids out-think, outmaneuver, and outwit these unusual creatures in Bobby’s Troll and Other Stories. Whether they are helping a leprechaun to retire or trying to convince a satyr to move back into the wardrobe he was living in, one thing is for sure, a lot of fun (and just a little bit of chaos) is certain to follow.

As a parent, I've been tempted.

Silas Irgbottom sipped his lemonade and enjoyed the buzzing of the summer cicada from his porch. His prize roses were in full bloom, except for the mangled Alba Maxima. He tried not to look in her direction. He had done what he could, pruning the broken stems, but so many buds had been lost. Alba was a temperamental plant. This would wreck her for the summer.

Which was horribly disappointing. At seventy-seven, Silas often wondered how many summers he had left. Who was to say if this was his last chance to see Alba in all her glory? Sure, he tried to eat right and stay healthy, but the gut from years of sitting on his duff as a sales manager, and the high blood pressure that went along with it, wasn't going away any time soon.

There was a groan from the lawn. The thirteen year old hooligan slowly sat up. He had long black hair and wore a t-shirt for some band that Silas assumed he would hate. The boy reached for his butt and grimaced when he touched the left cheek.

Suddenly, the boy became aware of Silas.

"You shot me!" he yelled.

Silas held up the tranquilizer gun. "What did I tell you kids about trespassing in my yard? You have a lot of nerve, coming after the baseball that shattered Alba." Silas gestured at the evidence he had found resting on Alba's roots earlier that afternoon.

"My parents are going to sue you!" the boy shouted.

"Because I shot you in the butt? In that case, they'll be really upset by your new earring."

The boy reached up and touched the blue tag that Silas had attached to his ear.

"That there is homing beacon, kind of like what scientists use to track bears in the wilderness. Only this one lets me keep tabs on you. You tell your little delinquent friends they can expect the same if I catch any of them on my property. As for you, I'll know the next time you trespass and trust me, I next time I won't be aiming for your rear end. Now get out of here."

The boy didn't have to be prodded twice. Weeping, he darted over Silas's fence and disappeared. Silas went back to his lemonade. Looking at the laptop next to him, he could track the boy's departure on an online map. Silas smiled. That one wouldn't be back again.

He drifted off to sleep in the summer sun.

The loud buzzing of his computer as well as the ringing of his doorbell snapped Silas out of his nap. He couldn't believe it, the boy had returned.

"Must be a slow learner," Silas muttered as he reloaded his dart gun and headed for the front door.

He yanked the door open, half expecting a bag of fiery dog poop to be on his front step.

Instead it was the boy, his mother, and a girl Silas assumed was his younger sister. The mother's fawn colored hair was bobbed and she wore a blue summer dress with white flows on it.

"Are you the man that put that, thing, in my son's ear?"

Silas drew himself up to his full height, which at five foot five put him eye to eye with the boy's mother. "Yes I did. He and his troublemaker friends have repeatedly trespassed through my yard. This afternoon his baseball destroyed my favorite rose."

"Oh, I'm very sorry about that. I can pay for the roses," the mother replied.

Silas was taken aback. "Um, well, that isn't necessary. Alba will grow back."

"Is it true, that the tag will track my sons whereabouts?"

"Yes..." Silas responded slowly, uncertain as to the direction of the conversation. "I can use a computer to track his movements."

"Can I buy that program?"

"What?"

"Oh, and how much would it cost to put a tag in my daughter's ear?"

"Moooooom!" whined the daughter.

"Hush," the mother hissed. To Silas she said, "This would be such a boon to me. I'm always worrying where they are. Being able to check a website while I'm at work, or in the evening, it's every parent's dream. In fact, when I told my friends about it, they would like their children tagged as well, as long as it wasn't too expensive. It isn't, is it?"

Silas didn't have to be hit over the head with a baseball bat. "Oh no, not expensive at all," he quickly threw out a price. "It's a subscription, so that's monthly," he added.

"Oh, that's very reasonable. Can we do it today?"

Silas nodded, "Yes we can. There's also, one more, small item."

"Yes, what is that?"

"They have to stay out of my yard."

THE END                                                                                                         copyright 2013 John Lance

Let me just say up front, no dogs were harmed in this episode.

Breaking News: The Gazette has learned that SouthFarm resident Cleatus Brigoon has been arrested in relation to the recent electrocution of his neighbor Henry Floyd. The charge is First Degree Murder.

Floyd's death last week was considered a bizarre tragedy when his male dog, Rex, urinated on a transformer box in front of Brigoon's home. The dog's pee struck a live wire. Electricity arced up the stream, passed through Rex, ran along his leash, and electrocuted his unfortunate owner.

On a happy note, Rex was unharmed.

SouthFarm Police Chief Edward Jones said Brigoon came to the attention of investigators early.

"Witnesses reported seeing Mr. Brigoon dancing gleefully about the charred corpse shouting 'That's the last time your dog takes a dump on my lawn,'" Jones said.

According to neighbors, Brigoon and Floyd had been feuding for years. Brigoon claimed that Floyd encouraged his dog to defecate in Brigoon's prize winning rose garden, which is situated near the street.

Floyd, on the other hand, never forgave Brigoon for cutting down a large apple tree Floyd felt was on his side of the property line.

Brigoon confessed to deliberately tampering with the transformer to expose a live wire. He told police that in addition to Rex doing his business in the rose garden, the dog regularly peed on the transformer.

"I'm glad Rex is okay," Brigoon reportedly said when taken into custody.

A bail hearing will be held on Monday.

THE END                                                                                                                                       copyright 2013 John Lance

Fortunately this would never happen in the real world...

"There's one!" shouted Murry as he used his iPad to crush a fist sized, eight legged, pincer equipped death-bot scurrying across the table. The screen popped out of the iPad, and even though he had just violated the warranty and would never be able to convince Apple to give him access to the 2500 songs he had downloaded, he smiled.

The conference room he, Jim, and Anne had taken shelter in made Murry feel claustrophobic. The large rectangular table left barely enough room to pull out a chair, and the green walls that were supposed to make for calm meetings reminded Murry of the color cartoon characters turned right before they puked.

Overhead, the lights flickered and died.

"Oh crap," Murray said. Hurriedly he pressed the speaker button on the phone on the table but was met by stone dead silence. "Better and better," he muttered.

"I don't see any more," Anne said as she peered under the table. The frizzy haired, eyebrow-pierced intern had started at DeFez Tech that morning. "Is it over?" she asked hopefully.

"I doubt it," Murry said as he poked at the broken ball of circuits and gears that had been the death-bot. After a moment he shook his head. "As I suspected. This is a second generation bot. They're already replicating. Once they escaped quarantine they must have started tearing apart the building for resources."

Murry continued. "I actually wrote the replication software. A really nice, elegant bit of code that, I'll have to take you through it. We had to account for a number of variables..." Murry noticed the horrified look on Anne's face and stopped. He cleared his throat and called over his shoulder, "Jim, any luck finding the designs?"

"Yea, I found them. You're sure about the universal self destruct code?" The glow of Jim's laptop was reflected in his glasses as he scanned the document. The battery warning light on his keyboard was flashing. 

"Yes, I distinctly remember talking about it. We just have to transmit the code and the whole army of death-bots shuts down. Otherwise they would be unstoppable," he added to Anne, with a touch of pride.

Jim paused his scanning. "Here's the bit about them being able to communicate over the wireless network," he said grimly.

"What does that mean?" Anne asked, her voice rising, tears threatening.

"Oh, just that the one I crushed probably told the others we're here. But I assumed that," said Murry, trying to sound nonchalant. His mind raced as he tried to remember the death-bots' weaknesses. Unfortunately, he couldn't think of a single one outside other than self destruct. Defenz Tech built high quality products.

Jim paused again. "And here's the aggregation algorithm."

Murry rolled his eyes. "Remember that? Right at the end of the project too."

"What are you talking about?!?!?" Anne yelled.

"There's no need to panic," said Murry.

"Actually, in this case..." said Jim.

"Fine, okay, maybe there is reason to panic. But yelling and screaming will only attract them. The aggregation algorithm allows a bunch of death-bots join together to create a larger machine. Kind of like your body is made up of individual cells."

"They can grow?" Anne whispered.

"After a fashion, yes. It was a requirement that came in from the Army. What a nightmare. We had to delay the release and defer a bunch of features."

Anne looked confused and Murry remembered it was her first day. "When we defer a feature that means we don't do it until the next release. There were some good ones in there too. Laser sight eyes, venomous spines, enhanced leaping capability..."

"The self destruct code," injected Jim.

"The self destruct... what?" asked Murry.

Jim pointed at his screen. DEFERRED was written in big red letters next to "Self Destruct Code."

Suddenly something large and heavy slammed against against the door, making it jump on its hinges. Anne screamed and Jim fell off his chair. Through the small window in the door, they could make out a hulking, metallic shape.

"So this is how the world ends. Not with a bang, but with a deferred requirement," Murry muttered.

THE END                                                                                                                           Copyright 2013 John Lance

Happy 4th of July!

<click>

"...good enough to eat, heh, heh. Now. for more on coverage of the festivities, we'll take you over to Anni Zoob who is covering the annual Running of the Humans in New York. Anni?"

"Thanks Ted. Every city and town in New America likes to celebrate Zombie Independence with a traditional human run, but none can compare with the Big Apple's Running of the Humans. Behind me you can see the cages being lowered into position. Two hundred humans will be released on Madison Avenue at noon, and given 30 minutes to disperse. Then the Freedom Bell will be rung and the crowd will be free to hunt and gorge. Thousands have come down to watch the release. There isn't a dry chin down here."

"Speaking of which, I see a bit of drool on your lapel as well."

"Ha, thanks Ted. What can I say, the atmosphere, the stench, my stomach's rumbling. I've got my helmet and I plan to be out with the crowd once the Dinner Bell rings."

"You mean the Freedom Bell?"

"Right, the Freedom Bell. This is Anni Zoob signing off."

"Thanks Anni. Of course, in our modern society, no tradition, no matter how revered, is without its controversy. And that includes the beloved Running of the Humans. With us now is Professor Mort Vivisac who is leading a group determined to ban the practice. Tell us why Professor, are you concerned with the treatment of the humans?"

"...."

"Hmm, a little technical glitch with the Professor's microphone. Professor can you hear us?"

"Yes I can hear you Ted, can you hear me now?."

"Yes we can, thank you Professor. So, tell our audience why you think the Running of the Humans should be banned."

"Well Ted, first there is just the inherit risk to all zombies of having humans running about loose. What if they escaped?"

"I must point out at this point Professor that in the decade that the Running of the Humans has been held no released human was ever at large for longer than twenty four hours. The only zombie fatality over those years was Bjorn Bronk, who tumbled off a ledge when he was pursuing a human."

"Just because it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean that it can't happen Ted. But setting aside that risk there is a greater issue here. For years the humans portrayed zombies as mindless eating machines in their media. Given the enlightened conversations we are having now we are obviously not. The Running of the Humans reinforces the worst stereotypes of zombie-kind."

"So you believe we should eat our food with knives and forks and dab the corner of our mouths with napkins and pinkies raised? You would have us be pretend humans Professor?"

"Please Ted, you are grossly distorting what I am saying. There is a vast difference between a public feeding frenzy and how one behaves in one's own home."

"We'll have to leave the debate there for now Professor. Coming up, more Channel 5 coverage of the Independence Day celebration. Also, an important health tip from Doctor Orp about keeping stump rot in check. You won't want to miss it. But first, a word from our sponsors."

"Argh, Bernie, this tastes like a human that's been left to rot in the sun for three days."

"That's the way I like it Joe. Dead and red."

"Not me, I like 'em Livin' and wigglin'."

"Dead and red!"

"Livin' and wigglin'"

"Fellas, fellas, there's no need to argue."

"Wolfgang Puck, what are you doing here?"

"Since having been zombified, I've dedicated my unlife to developing a culinary experience that will satisfy the zombie palate. I'm proud to introduce my new line of home dinners, Drop Dead Mea..."

<click>

THE END                                                                                                                                 copyright 2013 John Lance