Welcome Readers, to Volume 1, Issue 6 of  The Storyteller’s Newsletter.

News Update: The Warlord’s Daughter Love and War in Afghanistan has been published and the reviews are great. The forward of The Warlord’s Daughter was written by my son Richard Mason, an Afghan War, Special Forces veteran, who was my technical assistant in the writing of this book.  His insight into the Afghan people and their culture brings the novel to life. Many of the action scenes were based on his actual Special Forces’s fights with the Taliban and al-Qaida. The following are reviews from Amazon.com top reviewers: (517  pages with photos)

John Chancellor, New Orleans, LA…”If you are looking for entertaining, engaging fictional reading with lots of military and CIA intrigue with tender romance woven together, this would be a great read for you.” A five star review.

Amos Lassen, Little Rock, AR..the book is a first rate thriller.” A five star review.

Fritz Ward, Crestline, CA…”A tense and exciting ending wraps up a novel that is a once a very believable love and adventure story.” A five star review.

Lyin’ Like a Dog , the sequel to The Red Scarf has 8 five star reviews. It can be  ordered from the Amazon.com book’s web-page. “The Blood” chapter is the funniest yet.

D. Roberts, Battle Creek, Michigan…”I found it to be a delightful and charming string of loosely connected adventures and misadventures…” Five Stars

Betty Dravis, Silicon Valley, CA…”I’m still smiling as I recommend Lyin’ Like a Dog to young and old alike.” Five Stars

Robert Yokoyama, Mililani, Hawaii…”a very heart warming coming of age memoir.” Five stars.

Just released: The Yankee Doctor : It’s good vs evil as the boys try to run the evil doctor and his nurse out of town before he can have them sent to reform school. Some of the funniest situations I have ever written are in this novel. The novel has already three reviews—All five star!                     The Storyteller : Richard Mason 

Hot, hot, hot, dang; it’s so blessed hot I can’t even walk across the stupid road. Uh, huh, that’s right. My feet is so tough I can run through a sticker-burr patch without it bothering me a bit. Heck, when you’ve been going barefoot since April you can step on just about anything…except a blacktop highway. Wow, about three steps and it feels like you are walking on hot coals. But you know what? Having tough feet can be kinda fun. Just last week Ronnie, from the big city of Tulsa came to Norphlet for the summer, and wouldn’t you know it. The danged kid hadn’t even taken off his shoes all summer. Well, after we laughed at him and called him a sissy, he shed them shoes and shirt where he would look just like us, but he didn’t. Heck, he was so white it looked as if someone had dumped a bag of flour on him. But not for long. The next day he was a red as a firetruck from burning up in the sun. Blistered all to heck. And then…yeah, we should have done it but we couldn’t help it.
“Hey, Ronnie! Come on we’re going to the ballfield!” I yelled and looked at John Clayton as I pointed at a big open field that I knew was full of sticker burrs and bull nettles. “Come on, Ronnie! You slowpoke! Hurry!” Well, we took off across that field running through sticker burr patches and dodging the big green bull nettles. None of that stuff bothered our tough feet. But Ronnie got about half way across when he pulled up like some lame mule. “Ahaaaa! I got stickers in my feet! And I done stepped in a bull nettle! Heck, it was the funnest thing we’d done in a month of Sundays. Ronnie crawled over to the edge of the field and sat there whining while we laughed and he pulled out stickers. “Look at my feet!” Ronnie whinned. “Then bull nettles stings is killing me!” We quit laughing and said, “Shoot, Ronnie, if you want to stop the bull nettle stings you, just pee on your feet.” “What?” “Yep,” said John Clayton it’s the only way stop the burning and stinging. Cross my heart…hope to die.” Well, Ronnie had his doubts, but with a little egging on, he peed on both feet. Heck, I don’t have no idea if peeing on your feet would stop a bull nettle sting from hurting, but it sure was funny to see one of your friends pee on his feet. Heck, later that day, Doc ran him out of the newsstand cause his feet was smelling up the place.

Well, several of y’all has asked me what was it like to live on a little farm way back yonder in 1944. Okay, just listen up and I’ll tell you. First off, and the mostest important part of living on the farm is not being seen…uh, huh, at least not being seen by your daddy. If you think I’m gonna walk out to the barn when daddy is tending to the mules, you’ve got another think coming. Sure as I do he’s gonna put a shovel or rake in my hand. So the way it usually works best for me is to run in the house after school, chunk my books in my room and head for Flat Creek Swamp. Heck, just fooling around or going swimming in the creek sure beats hoeing in the garden or feeding the chickens. But you know you’ve alway gotta show up at supper or dinner, if it’s in the summer, and I can’t eat fast enough to keep from getting a list of chores as long as your arm. Heck, I won’t even get sat down until daddy will say, “Richard when you gather eggs this afternoon, clean the manure out of the chicken house.” And before I can even tell a little white lie and say, “Uh, Daddy, I done cleaned it out….” Daddy will jump in and say something like, “Oh, yeah, Richard and get the garden hose and wash the mules.” Yep, it’s work, work, work, and sometimes I think I’m gonna drop dead…well, it ain’t that bad, but living on a farm will shore nuff keep you busy. But you know, it ain’t all bad. Heck, I swim in the creek in a great swimming hole almost every day, and go fishing, pick blackberries, and just have all kinds of fun. Just thinking about it makes me be glad I live on a farm. Shoot, I might get stung by a bee or wasp and you gotta watch out for snakes, but it’s worth it to run free in the woods.

Okay, now, before y’all go and blame me and John Clayton for ‘borrowing’ that Christmas tree from old man Odom, let me just lighten up yore mind. You see, that old coot is as mean as a sack of snakes, and he’s alway ragging us boys, blaming us for all kinda stuff, which we might not have done. Well, maybe we did do some of them things, but he shore can’t prove it, and according to Mr. Attaway, our Civic’s teacher, we ain’t guilty until he proves it without no doubts. So, would you blame us if old man Odom had just forgot to cut down that perfect Christmas tree over in the edge of his yard, and we slipped up a week before Christmas and ‘borrowed’ it? Naw, you see, we figured as much as old man Odom likes to clear land, it just missed that perfect 8′ cedar tree in his front yard. Yeah, and we should be kinda patted on the back for helping him clear his yard of that danged tree, but no not in a million years. Would you belive he grabbed John Clayton by his shirt collar a few days later and just went on and on how he just knowed John Clayton and of course me, was the ones that got his sorry old tree. Well, after that we scatter like a covey of quail when we see that old coot coming, slobbing tobacco juice down his beard and spitting gunk all over the sidewalk. Yeah, I know you might say we should’ve asked if he minded..you know if he cared if we cut that tree, but heck, it was about 9 at night when we decided to cut it down and after we drug it out of his yard, he started shooting at us with birdshot. I figured, as we was running down the road, that we’d done waited too long to ask. Anyway, Mr. Attaway said we ain’t guilty till we’s proven..without no doubts, so stand by and sometime later in the week I’ll feel you in on the rest of the story.

I don’t know how to tell y’all this, but me and John Clayton has got in trouble again, and it’s serious as death trouble…you know big time switching trouble. Well, listen up and I’ll tell you how it happened, and I think y’all will see it weren’t nothing we did.

You see we’d finally scraped up enough money to go to the circus in El Dorado…you know Ringling Brothers, Barnam and Baily… biggest circus in the entire world…that’s what folks say. Anyway, we had a special ticket a man a gaved us for putting up posters. It was to see Guaruantua, the great ape. Well, when we got into the tent where the big ape was, he was sound asleep. Heck, nobody in the entire world wants to see a sleeping ape, so I had this real smart idea…we would stand by each end of the cage and hiss like a big snake. John Clayton would hiss then I’d hiss. What we was trying to do was to just wake him up where we could see him better. The hissing started and we did, wake him up and then some. I knew we shoulda stopped, but John Clayton got carried away and after old Guaruantua got up and started shaking the bars, John Clayton went into a hissing fit. Oh my good Lord in heaven above!…he shouldn’t a-done that. For you could move one of them bars cracked, and we both let out a scream you could have heard in Norphlet. Heck, we was sure that big ape was gonna come outta that cage and start pulling people’s arms off, so we ran out of the tent screaming, “Guaruantua is escaping! Run for your lives!” Uh, well that kinda got peoples attention, and they was the dangest yelling you’ve ever heard and a big crowd of folks went running down the midway. Heck, we was running like a scalded dog and was halfway back to Norphlet brfore you could turn around. 

Now, we’re in more trouble than you can imagine. The danged ape didn’t get out, but as the sherrif, said, “It was two boys from Norphlet which caused all the trouble, and we’re gonna find out who they is.”

Now, all we was trying to do was see Guaruantua stand up. It wasn’t our fault that he woked up in a bad mood.

 Well, it seems like folks is always trying to blame me and John Clayton…heck we didn’t do nothing…much.