Historical Humor

Nicknamed after the gas mask he and his fellow soldiers will wear as they fight in the Persian Gulf War, Aardvark is a tactical jet crewman headed for combat in this dark comedy. He recounts the days before he is called to fight and the carrier's progress toward its destination in blistering prose. The war is really happening on TV, and everyone on the ship is tuned to CNN. Aardvark wanders the ship with video camera in hand, filming the rule-bound officers, musclehead bunkmates, and porn entrepreneurs in an attempt to tune out reality. But as the ship nears its destination, he is forced to face his growing fears and sense of alienation.

It's summer and renowned actress, Dame Pamela Harcourt, has organized a treat: the first Purley Hall Jane Austen holiday - to the home of Mr. Darcy no less. With Katherine and Warwick, Robyn, Doris Norris and the rest of the gang, it's going to be a trip to remember.

This novelette is an homage to the amazing P. G. Wodehouse and his legendary characters Jeeves and Bertie Wooster. While living in 1920's New York City, Bertie is saddled with looking after the son of one of his Aunt Agatha's best mates, the Lady Mallowan. Bertie thinks that the young Lord Wiltshire is a useless, annoying nitwit, but he has no idea that left on his own a completely different side of the young Dermot will start to emerge, putting Bertie in a serious pickle.

When a young brother and sister decide to effect an Unrest Cure on the prematurely middle-aged proprietors of a country hotel, success seems assured. Until, that is, the arrival of an unexpected guest....

Five historical short stories with a pinch of parody and conspiracy theory twists....

While almost entirely fictional, this story about the famous entertainer Barnum, his beautiful daughter, and one very clever clown, set against the backdrop of an old-fashioned circus, is witty, sweet, and romantic.

It is 1886 and the venerable publishing firm of Garnett and Son are getting by - just - when a manuscript comes in from a Mr. Conan Doyle. The manuscript divides the firm; Garnett Sr. loathes it and its hero, Sherlock Holmes, but Garnett Jr. loves it. The father and son agree to a bet: if they can solve a local murder, using Holmes' methods, they will publish. If not, Sherlock Holmes will be confined to the dustbin of history.

This is a short tale about life in the Appalachian Mountains in the 1800s. It entails the hardships of lonely mountain men and a beautiful red-headed woman with the body of a duck.

The warrior Mithra must repel a Roman legion alone and armed only with one very tasty weapon. The Romans are marching! To protect her lands and her tribe, Mithra comes up with a sticky solution to an impossible problem.

It is 1658 - the dying days of the English Republic under the Cromwells - and a down-on-his-luck publisher, Bartholomew Garnet, gets the chance to publish Paradise Lost by John Milton. But why is the office of censorship so interested in the manuscript? Why is his obliging new housekeeper asking so many questions? And will Garnet discover principles in time to get Paradise Lost published?

In this short story from Nathan Englander's collection For the Relief of Unbearable Urges, a clerical error lands earnest, unpublished Pinchas Pelovits in prison with 26 other writers.