The Luna Park Gazette

There’s a tombstone in St. Paul’s Cemetery on Fulton Street with a biblical quote reading “The Souls of the Righteous are In God’s Hands.” It’s pretty hard to miss and whenever I see it, I can’t help but think “ and the rest of you losers are in very deep shit .” I’ve been thinking more about the End of Days these days. I suspect it has something to do with a pamphlet I recently read that predicted the Rapture is coming our way next spring. I picked up this item while walking through the Grand Central subway station on my way to the shuttle to Times Square. The passageway is a popular spot for musicians, prophets, and other assorted street performers who save souls or sing songs to the disinterested masses. You’ve got a built-in audience down there, especially during rush hour. On this particular day I saw a sign taped to a pillar proclaiming “ The End of the World is Almost Here! Holy God Will Bring Judgment Day on May 21, 2011! ” The world is going to end in less a year? Holy crap! I...

I've been searching through my house for Phoenix Prime , a fantasy novel by Ted White that I read when I was in high school. I'm not particularly interested in re-reading this book and I doubt seriously the story would hold up after all these years. What I really want to see is the book’s cover. The cover illustration for Phoenix Prime shows the muscular back and shoulder of man on some distant—and quite hostile-looking--alien terrain. He’s clutching a stone in his right hand as a pack of red-eyed wolves move in on him. I had been laboring under the mistaken impression that this classic image of man versus beast had been created by James Bama, my favorite book cover artist. But a quick jog around the Internet revealed that the painting had actually been done by Frank Frazetta, my other favorite book cover artist. I grew up reading science fiction and fantasy novels and I can only guess how many of these books had cover art by either Bama or Frazetta. Their work helped me and a...

I don’t expect much in the way of surprises anymore when I open my mailbox. With everything shifting to the Internet, all I usually find in there when I come home at night are bills, junk mail and menus from just about every restaurant in North America. But last week I learned that conventional mail can still hold a few jolts. The first one actually came to my family's old house on 86th Street some 66 years ago in the form of a post card from my Uncle Walter to my Aunt Marie. My uncle was a pilot during World War II and he was writing to my aunt from the air base in Lawrenceville, Ill. There is a photo of Beechcraft Trainers on the front of the card and it is postmarked Feb. 19, 1944. The card came fluttering off a bookshelf in my bedroom while I was rearranging some paperbacks. I must have put it up there a long time ago for safe-keeping and, as usual, forgot all about it. I certainly don't remember reading it before. It's just a couple of handwritten lines, but looking b...

Good things really do come in threes. Over the last few weeks, I have been interviewd by the New York Times and appeared as a guest on CNN. But these events don’t begin to compare to my latest stroke of good fortune. I am happy—nay, ecstatic —to report that Lucy, my cousin’s beautiful 10-year-old daughter, has written a children’s story especially for me. The story is entitled “Rob” and it’s all about a magical rabbit named…Rob. I'm telling you, this one’s got “bestseller” written all over it. This Rob is no run-of-the-mill carrot-chomping cotton tail. He can speak, change colors, and glow in the dark. He even has pockets in his fur. I was overjoyed when I saw the story on Lucy’s blog (sorry, invitation only). I’ve never had a character named after me--especially one you can use for a lamp in case of a blackout. And the timing could not have been better, as I had just gone through a harrowing three-day period filled with nightmares of both the waking and sleeping variety. This was ...