Short Story Reviews: Thanksgiving Theme

Short fiction seems particularly suited to fun holiday themed stories. This week, I read about deadly pumpkin pie in the Kings River Life story Surviving the Feast: A Thanksgiving Mystery Short Story & Recipe by Joan Leotta (November 18 issue). You can read it free, while you're preparing the recipe, or fixing your own special desserts. I have a favorite pumpkin pie recipe. It comes on the back of every can of Libby's pumpkin, but I do add a secret ingredient to make it uniquely my own.

We are hosting Thanksgiving on Friday instead of Thursday. Several friends and family will have the traditional feast the day before. Hopefully our gathering will focus more on conversation and board games than on food, but we are planning to have all the fixings. My family is full of health nuts, but we won't go so far as Tofurky. Not this year. Lessons learned. We're preparing an organic free range turkey. I find my food tastes better when it lived a happy life. 

​Happy food comes from family ranches like Rafter W Ranch in Colorado. They didn't raise turkeys for sale this year, so we bought ours from the Natural Grocers health food store. Rafter W does raise chickens. I have enjoyed amazing roasted chicken from Rafter W Ranch. You have to try homegrown meat to believe how different it is from factory farm meat.

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​Back to fiction. I am still reading my way through The Killer Wore Cranberry: A Fifth Course of Chaos. Last week I talked about the first story in the anthology. This week I read The Capo-Clipped Capon Caper by Arthur Carey. 

Mediocre private detective Sam Spad is approached by two FBI agents. The turkey the President of the United States plans to pardon in the well-known annual ceremony has been snatched. The President can't miss this photo op, and so the FBI is keen to retrieve the bird. Their request seems unusual, but they seek out Sam due to a clue left by the perpetrators.

Both of the Thanksgiving themed stories I read this week were light-hearted, fun reads. If you haven't had enough leftovers yet, or if like us, the feasting has only just begun, I recommend you check these out.

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