Manhattan Book of the Dead
From the dust cover review by Carolus Linnaeus, emminent biologist:
"I have been asked to classify the Manhattan Book of the Dead to assist potential readers in learning what it's about. No mean accomplishment this, since I died in Sweden some 220 years ago. I continue to marvel that this proves no impediment at all to fiction. Therefore I have consented...
Belief is the underlying theme. Why do people believe the nutty things they do? You know: astrology, apparitions, angels and armageddon. Beats me. I concentrated on plants."
bfk is a satirical writer living in New York City.
When he's not busy writing fiction, he's usually busy not writing satire.
Property is theft. Here is the Manuscript Edition in pdf form. Help yourself.
“So when did you come to New York?” she asked.
“In 1976, a year after Ford told the city to drop dead. I wanted to see if it was still breathing.”
“And why did you come?”
“Because I saw Breakfast at Tiffany’s when I was ten.”
“That’s very romantic,” she observed, “but you weren’t ten when you arrived. So what prompted you in 1976?”
“I thought I would come here to write.”
“I see,” she said, “and they had no typewriters or paper where you were?”
“Only a modicum. It wasn’t a very literate place. I think only the university had typewriters.”
“And,” she interviewed, “what have you written since you’ve been here?”
“Very little.”
“And why is that?”
“Perhaps because they don’t pay me.”
“Who doesn’t pay you?”
“Everyone doesn’t pay me.”
“You mean you write something and then everyone doesn’t pay you?”
“Precisely.”
So you don’t write because you want to be paid?”
“Yes.”
“When you’re not not writing, what don’t you write?”
“Usually I don’t write topical satire.”
“Oh,” she assumed, “that’s quite humorous, isn’t it?”
“No. Not at all,” I contradicted. “Whatever isn’t published can’t be kept in the freezer for a later day.”
“I think I understand,” she said. “The reason you don’t write is because you won’t write comedy because you find it tragic.”
“You’ve hit it on the head,” I agreed.
bfk is the pseudonym for Bruce F. Krueger