A fugitive soda machine, the recovery of a chronic apathetic, a super hero who interviews for a job in a larger city, and the trial of the Cat in the Hat. Food as nuclear material, a black-mailing trick-or-treater, the last comedy club in America. I'm Right Here, Fish-Cake is full of the odd and the unexpected. "[T]he humorous essay is the free throw made just before the buzzer:
If you sink it, you both score and win the game. If you don't,
you begin to consider another career. Jeffrey Shaffer ...
has a good record at the line in I'm Right Here, Fish-Cake."
—Karen Karbo, Portland Oregonian
"In this quirky collection of short humor pieces ... the reader is treated to a peek at life
in a parallel universe. Satirizing every mode of communication and literary genre ...
he zeroes in on the modern American psyche with laser accuracy and loving affection.
Here is mind candy that's actually good for you, high in intellectual fiber
but easy to digest. Devour it in one sitting, or ration it out and savor every bite-size nugget."
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Modern culture ... reaches the soothing level of total weirdness in this collection.
—Faris Cassell, Eugene Register-Guard
Imagine The Far Side in prose as matter-of-fact as James Thurber's and you have some idea what Jeffrey Shaffer's humor pieces are like. Shaffer employs his rich imagination to make the strangest situations and people seem just the way things are. He makes readers laugh as well as see things differently.
His humor comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes, from monologues and stories to letters, personals, even play-by-play. The pieces are full of parody, satire, storytelling, farce, surprises and flights of fancy, with a touch of pathos added for good measure. And lots of smiles and laughs.
Publishers Weekly has noted that this book was being published "in almost giddy defiance of all the humor trends in publishing." If you're tired of repetitive, predictable, and sophomoric humor, Shaffer is the guy you've been looking for. Just like Catbird had been for years.
$12.95 paper, $3 e-book, 192 pp., ISBN 0-945774-30-3.
An e-book of I'm Right Here, Fish-Cake can now be purchased directly from Catbird Press in PDF, EPub, or MOBI (Kindle) formats for $3.
Payment is via Pay Pal (our Pay Pal e-mail address is catbird@pipeline.com). Include a note in your payment, such as
"Please send a (format name) of Fish-Cake to (your e-mail address)" or send a separate e-mail to info@catbirdpress.com,
which we can respond to with the e-book attached.
Click here to read two sample stories from I'm Right Here, Fish-Cake.
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