Thomas Cleveland Lane

Shaggy Dogs: a Collection of Not-so-short Stories Thomas Cleveland Lane

This is a collection of true shaggy dog stories. They are not ?groaners,? such as: ?the furry with the syringe on top? or ?silly rabbi, kicks are for Grids.?

A shaggy dog story is one that takes or, rather, drags the reader through paragraph after paragraph of an adventure, often throwing him completely off the track, before finally dropping him off at a climax that is a complete let-down. The genre is called by its name because the first story of its ilk, relates to a shaggy dog.

When one person tells another person a shaggy dog story, the object is generally to victimize the listener by making the tale as long and boring as possible, so as to heighten the disappointment. I have tried to make these stories very long indeed, but, at the same time, I have tried to keep the reader very much entertained throughout, in the belief that it is not the destination, but the journey that matters.

The ostensible editor (writing under a pen-name) but actual author of all the tales is also the odd Czech poet Glub Dzmc, whom you will meet in the appendix, as well as his distant ancestor, Decius Brutus Dzmc, in the appendix to the appendix. It gets very complicated, after a while.

Finally, a cautionary note: this stuff is not porn, but it is not for children, even if it is, in many instances, extremely puerile?which doesn?t mean you won?t bust a stitch laughing.