People drift to work, starting early to end early. Local notables pass outside, the mayor leaves, to make Millhaven more orderly Lyons, the university president for a decade, passes – a smug and subtle cheerleader Does what town fathers ask Considers student silence golden Phil Bartram, city planning consultant, here a year, seems longer Thinks…

How are you, Ronnie asks. We saw Sophie. Ex-wife number two, back on campus after sabbatical. His way of warning me. Thanks. The mayor walks in. Our first mayor, first term. Gray hair, gray suit, blue tie, blue blood of Millhaven’s hue. Pale blue, watercolor. The mayor glances dismissively my way. He opposed the office,…

I live downtown, above the Agneau Grille, a Tunisian restaurant. Tasty lamb requires no passport. Restaurants, bars, small shops behind aging facades. Banners welcoming returning students, faded flyers in windows. Outside, cool autumn air. Cigarette butts on sidewalk – tokens of indifference, rebellion. I smile, lighting a Lucky Strike. A fat man walks by, eyeing…

The sound of waves crashing against the beach repeats every 42 seconds. Less than a minute and a seagull squawks again. I could measure time easily if the pattern repeated every 60 seconds. Instead: 42, 84, 126. Two minutes gone. Forever. I reach up, turn off the machine. Without ocean sounds, I can’t sleep. Is…

The Orange Salamander describes a small-town mystery, but ‘small-town mystery’ is as conventional as the story’s description gets. If you mixed a hard-boiled crime story with a cyberpunk novel, and asked a non-writer to write it, The Orange Salamander is what you might get. The story is a twiller, a thriller told in small bits,…