Four Fantastical Ways to Lose Your Fingers: A Speculative Short Story Collection

by Michael G. Munz, Z.D. Gladstone, Tiffany Pitts

Shooting off hands with lasers. Gambling fingers in a supernatural poker game. Poking a bear. These are just some ways to lose a finger that are not covered in this anthology.

This collection of fantastical stories follows a theme of “ways to lose a finger,” so you can bet someone is having bloody, handy trouble in each one. From comedy to creepy, from heroics to hopelessness, these light fantasy nibbles will entertain and enlighten about the human condition, even if that enlightenment only consists of “don’t stick that in there.” So settle in for some mythological comedy, cyberpunk, ghostly horror, superhero satire, and a big, fat, trans-dimensional cat!

Featuring four all new tales from Seattle authors Z.D. Gladstone, Michael G. Munz, Tiffany Pitts, and Janine A. Southard, Four Fantastical Ways to Lose Your Fingers is a brilliant short story collection that’s guaranteed to waste at least 30 minutes of your time. Maybe even 3 hours, depending on how fast you read.

To prevent physical injury, please keep all hands and fingers inside the book.

88 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 21, 2017

About the author

An award-winning writer of speculative fiction, Michael G. Munz was born in Pennsylvania but moved to Washington State in 1977 at the age of three. Unable to escape the state’s gravity, he has spent most of his life there and studied writing at the University of Washington.

Michael developed his creative bug in college, writing and filming four exceedingly amateur films before setting his sights on becoming a novelist. Driving this goal is the desire to tell entertaining stories that give to others the same pleasure as other writers have given to him. He enjoys writing tales that combine the modern world with the futuristic or fantastic.

Michael has traveled to three continents, and has an interest in Celtic and Classical mythology. He also possesses what most "normal" people would likely deem far too much familiarity with a wide range of geek culture, though Michael prefers the term geek-bard: a jack of all geek-trades, but master of none—except possibly Farscape and Twin Peaks.

Michael dwells in Seattle where he continues his quest to write the most entertaining novel known to humankind and find a really fantastic clam linguine.

Reviews

[Esther · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wasn't sure what to expect as I started reading the short stories. But one thing I did know I was in for a treat as it started off with a short story by Michael Munez and familiar characters from "Zeus is Dead" especially the return of one of my favorite character Thalia. The book had a great flow to it almost as though the stories kinda merger with each other.....meaning the stories didn't feel out of place with each other .... even thought they all had a mutual topic, I have read other short story books that didn't flow as well. Each of the authors have their own unique style of storytelling/writing but yet they all managed to give the reader a vivid description of what was happening within the story. Not picking favorites here but I really enjoyed "Style Is Personal" by Janine A. Southard. I'm a picky reader but each of these authors had something that I enjoyed about their story. I'm glad I was sent a copy of this book it introduced me to new authors and I will definitely check out their other books.

[Laura May · Rating 5 out of 5]

An anthology of four excellent short stories by talented writers. I'd read a couple of these authors before and enjoyed the shout-outs to their other works; this anthology, though, is stand-alone and will likely be a good introduction for people looking for new authors in the humour/spec-fic cross-over zone. One of the strengths was the length of the stories - they were long enough to be satisfying, while not too long as to drag on.

Definitely worth checking out.

[Liz Etnyre · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of 4 short stories includes one by the author of Wizzy Wig, need I say more?!
Mything Digits is OK, and probably better if you already have relationship with this author's (Munz) writings. Only about a 3 for me. Style is Personal is better, and a solid 4. Temporally Misplaced and The Foot Bridge (hey, Toesy!) are 5s. Nice set of shorts - well worth the buck I paid for them!