When Leigh Harline and Ned Washington penned "When You Wish Upon a Star" for Disney's 1940 film Pinocchio, the song came like a bolt out of the blue. Like Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg's "Over the Rainbow" from The Wizard of Oz one year earlier, "When You Wish Upon a Star" comes on the heels of the Great Depression and just shy of America's sudden jolt into a second global conflict. Both tunes reach outward and upward with their memorable octave leaps. Both have aged into ...

Welcome to Jake's Monthly. This month's trip around the best and strangest genres has taken us to Alternate History- a popular subgenre of SciFi where history turned out differently.We have all sorts of flavors here, including light fantasy, steampunk, military, and Bizarro. These stories are intelligent, well-written, and overall good examples of the genre.So, sit down, pull up a chair, and gaze into worlds where you never did.We hope you enjoy your stay.

The funeral business is changing. Don't let it bury you.Since its inception, the funeral and cemetery business has stuck to the status quo. After all, other than taxes, death is the only sure thing in life. But the world is changing more rapidly than ever. As a funeral or cemetery professional, you have to keep up if you don't want to get buried.Written by Jake Johnson, president and CEO of the premier consulting firm for the funeral and cemetery business, Staying Alive in th...

This is the second anthology published by the publisher Jake's Monthly, whose goal is to publish a new collection of short fiction every month for at least a year.This collection contains nothing but stories inspired by H.P. Lovecraft, a man who was likely the most influential horror writer of all time. The stories within are amazingly diverse, spreading out from Lovecraft's signature fear of the unknown to his lesser-known comedic stylings and even extending as far as a genre whic...

From 1981 to 1994, music patron and art collector Betty Freeman (1921--2009) hosted a series of monthly musicales, or salons, in Los Angeles. Most of these salons were held in a room off the den of Freeman's Beverly Hills home--a space she dubbed "the music room." Freeman saw these salons as an important space to foster the development of contemporary composition among leading and upcoming composers in both America and Europe. Over the span of thirteen seasons, 144 composers, performers, a...

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints adopted the vocal and theatrical traditions of American musical theater as important theological tenets. As Church membership grew, leaders saw how the genre could help define the faith and wove musical theater into many aspects of Mormon life. Jake Johnson merges the study of belonging in America with scholarship on voice and popular music to explore the surprising yet profound link between two quintessentially American institutions. Through...

Welcome to Jake's Monthly. This look at the weirdest and best genres out there has taken us to Locked-Room Mysteries- Mystery fiction where the crime is specifically impossible.These stories are largely contemporary with a bit of Western flair. Some of them are incredibly immersing and others are opportunities for a shrewd reader to solve the mystery before the investigator.So, welcome. Take a seat.We hope you enjoy your stay.

The local and regional shows staged throughout America use musical theater’s inherent power of deception to cultivate worldviews opposed to mainstream ideas. Jake Johnson reveals how musical theater between the coasts inhabits the middle spaces between professional and amateur, urban and rural, fact and fiction, fantasy and reality, and truth and falsehood. The homegrown musical provides a space to engage belief and religion—imagining a better world while creating opportunities to expand w...

Note: Several stories in this collection contain cursing. About two contain sexual references, two make your heart sing, one is joyfully absurd, another somber, and several others are exceedingly clever.This book is an anthology of science fiction. It is also the first anthology in the series known as "Jake's Monthly". This is the project's maiden voyage, and a lot of experienced writers, award-winners, editors and new voices have contributed. We hope that ou enjoy this collection....

Welcome to Jake's Monthly. This literary voyage into the obscure and the bizarre is celebrating its six-month anniversary with Bizarro, a literary movement dedicated to the strangest and most entertaining stories possible.This volume is intended for people who want a change of pace, an injection of unadulterated, nonsensical fun in their lives, and high-quality stories that they won't find anywhere else.These stories contain an ammunition-wearing cow, a horse whisperer, a p...

All throughout November, fresh and experienced authors submitted stories of dead and dying worlds. This is the result.Welcome to Jake's Monthly, a project designed to produce a new, themed short-story collection every month. Having just escaped Lovecraftian Horror, we now find ourselves in the ashen seas of the Post Apocalypse. Prepare yourself for bleak tragedies, fun flash pieces, and a glimpse of hope amidst the rubble.

Welcome to Jake's Monthly. Our latest collection takes us to Magic Realism, a lighter flavor of Fantasy fiction.This collection contains the paranormal, the supernatural, and the downright fantastical with works ranging from a children's story to poetic fiction to a story of a personal apocalypse.We hope you enjoy your stay.