Monday, April 1, 2013

Don't be an April Fool!

April Fools' Day leaves everyone open for practical jokes (hopefully all in fun!). But here are some stories about practical jokes, deception, pranks and devious plots that sometimes take a wrong turn.

Leaven of Malice by Robertson Davies
A false engagement announcement, printed in the Salterton Evening Bellman and heralding the impending marriage of a university instructor and a professor's daughter, sets off a chain of misadventures and misunderstandings.

The Keep by Jennifer Egan
Two decades after taking part in a childhood prank whose devastating repercussions changed their lives forever, two cousins are reunited to work on the renovation of a medieval castle in Eastern Europe, a remote, eerie site profoundly influenced by its bloody past, where the two are cut off from the outside world and doomed to reenact the horrific event from their past.

Kill Two Birds and Get Stoned by Kinky Friedman
Walter Snow, an author with writer's block, meets Clyde Potts, a feisty and unhinged woman, and her partner in crime, Fox Harris, whose love for a good prank inspires him to write, but their ultimate prank of corporate sabotage gets out of hand.

Where you Once Belonged by Kent Haruf
Former high-school football hero Jack Burdette returns to his hometown eight years after he had left, but his one-time pranks and high-spirited high jinks have turned into crimes--with terrifying consequences for the people of Holt County.

Dictation: a quartet by Cynthia Ozick
Four stories of comedy, deception, and revenge showcases heroes who suffer from willful self-deceit. These not-so-innocents proceed from self-deception to deceiving others, who do not take it lightly. The novella "Dictation" imagines a fateful meeting between the secretaries to Henry James and Joseph Conrad at the peak of their fame. Timid Miss Hallowes, who types for Conrad, comes under the influence of James's Miss Bosanquet, high-spirited, flirtatious, and scheming. In a masterstroke of genius, Ozick hatches a plot between them to insert themselves into posterity.

A Hole in Juan: an Amanda Pepper Mystery by Gillian Roberts
Philadelphia English teacher Amanda Pepper joins forces with her husband, C.K. Mackenzie, to investigate when a yearly tradition in which children play harmless pranks throughout the city on the night before Halloween turns deadly.

The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout
Catalyzed by a nephew's thoughtless prank, a pair of brothers confront painful psychological issues surrounding the freak accident that killed their father when they were boys, a loss linked to a heartbreaking deception that shaped their personal and professional lives.

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