Books and Stories

For decades, Carl Cook fought crime in the city of New Caliburn as the superhero Piecemaker. With the power to disassemble most everything around him, Carl was very good at taking things apart; less so at putting them back together. One divorce and an alienated daughter later, he realized the toll heroing had taken. In an attempt to move on and take charge of his life, Carl hung up the cape and opened Cook’s Deli.

But things are never that simple in the superhero capital of the world. Cook’s Deli has a front-row seat to the city’s superpowered exploits, from the exciting to the bizarre. A former sidekick discovers just how hard life is without a hero, a psychic rat goes on the warpath for another slice of rye, a D-list villain plots his revenge…these are just some of the adventures going on right in front of the deli counter. Carl may change the world, even more than he did in costume. Only now he does it one cold cut at a time.

In THE DELI COUNTER OF JUSTICE, you’ll explore the world in and around Cook’s Deli with nine stories and poems written by Kitty Chandler, Thomas Dorton, Rahne Ehtar, Alyssa Herron, Amorak Huey, C. Gayle Seaman, Eric Sipple, Paul Smith, and Arlo J. Wiley. Featuring an introduction by Mere Smith (Angel, Rome).

It’s senior year of high school, and everyone but Neil seems to know what’s next. All Neil wants is to be free: to survive his last year, and keep hoping something better is waiting for him in college. Then a musician named Celeste comes into his life.

Celeste doesn’t fit into Neil’s reality. She’s a runaway, chasing an impossible world. She can’t be like everyone else - and when he’s around her, Neil’s not himself, either.

Helping Celeste in her quest for magic – and the father who abandoned her to search for it – might cost Neil everything.

But when you don’t know your place in this world, and someone offers you another…is everything too high a price to pay?