Recipe for a memorable read: 1. Begin with a down-at-heels hotel-cum village saloon – owned by the author’s family. 2. Add: Suicide of its owner. Bankrupt business. Mother in Alzheimer’s abandoned. 3. Sweeten with characters: A Santa who spews poetry. A man who buries a fortune in a highway. A mom who wields a cleaver. A man who might well be buried in a beer cooler. 3. Add: Precious diamonds that turn worthless. A rooster in the taproom. A sister who does NOT exist, but suddenly does. A sister who exists but vanishes. A town you can’t get to. A vanishing pool table. 4. Sprinkle with: Dumbest-ever pooch that wins trophies. A young man who starts a dozen businesses. Genuine dog-napping. A family bilked by its dearest friend. The Miracle of the Stolen VW. The S.O.B. Hall of Fame. 5. Blend in: Mysterious inexplicable death of a church. A little girl lost who finds a family. A woman who cannot possibly play piano, plays. A nun plagued with guilt that must out. The result is a satisfying, entertaining adventure – a banquet that tickles your ribs while it touches your heart. One critic: “When it comes to wronged women and their men, Alzheimer’s and the special needs children and adults among us, these are among the most moving and powerful writings of our times.”

Jingles

What would you do? The world is gripped by a mysterious noise. Every person on earth hears it inside their head. Is it from aliens in the universe? From our abuse of the planet? From God? In “Jingles”, Tom Morgan portrays the calamity through the various experiences of members of the Beecher family. One serves as personal assistant to the President of the United States. One is a small-town minister who, by accident, attracts millions to his messages. One is a venture capital “swashbuckler-ess” who sees investment opportunity in the crisis. One immerses herself in remedies of Native Peoples, psychics, the Dali Lama and witches. One joins a worldwide movement that weaponizes sex. Ultimately, humanity confronts the noise in a multitude of dramatic moves. The result will surprise you as much as it did Earth’s 8 billion souls. From the actions of world leaders, shamans, generals, the Pope, witches and sex rompers the story is both serious and humorous. It offers food for thought and rib-tickling parody.

Did he batter her to death?  Or did she commit suicide? One pathologist insists he killed her.  The opposing pathologist insists she killed herself. This is the question the jury must decide in this classic of an American jury trial. Attending the trial, Tom Morgan skillfully and movingly portrays this drama in one of the country’s favorite hometowns. Through him, we visit various participants in the trial and family and friends of the accused. Finally, we sit in judgement of the trial itself.

“Mr. Morgan, you tell me you’re a writer.  Let them know what you witnessed here this week. Let the people know what you witnessed here.”  With these words, Ray Kelly, the attorney who defended, dispatched me from the courtroom at the end of the trial.  Outside I paused and took in the lights of the building. “Let the people know what you witnessed.”

Tom Morgan spent years researching trial transcripts and other pertinent records to create a gripping work of narrative non-fiction that encompasses his own impressions of the trial he was witnessing, a description of the personalities and architecture of Cooperstown, and his conversations with those directly and indirectly involved with the trial. Morgan offers skillfully written reportage in the tradition of Truman Capote’s “In Cold Blood.”

The Last Columnist

When he stabs a finger in the eyes of the elite, long-time columnist Mage Haus has to expect retaliation. But is he up for it? After all, he is not the power he once was. He was one of the most popular columnist-critic-commentators in America. Was. Before his angry reaction to his wife’s suicide soured his writing. Before a stroke of ill health, brought this Icarus to earth.

Now his notoriety and column gradually regain followers. He once more exposes corruption and malfeasance in Manhattan and lately at its Goth University. He is an equal-opportunity taunter of faculty, administrators and students who embrace political correctness on the campus.