Ansel Staton

February 21, 1999

Dear Mr. Daniel Pinkwater,

I own a copy of your book Young Adult Novel. In reading it, I have fallen under the impresion that you are some kind of anarchist. Congradulations (in my opinion). I am also interested in anarchy and enjoy listening to such groups as the damned. I am also wondering if your character “Captain Colossal” is taken from the Damned member Captain Sensible. I thank you for your exelent books and also for your intrest in Dadaism.

Sincerely Anselm Staton, Situationist

Lab User

February 19, 1999

Dear Sir I am hoping this finds you well. Have you ever discovered a drink called SOBE? If not I must send you soem because Your Lizards are abck and they are producing healthy and quite delicious drinks under the label SOBE. Trust me it is true and by the by I DID read afterlife diet and I thought it was as wonderful as only a Pinkwater Book can be

Jamie M Heise

February 19, 1999

Dear Mr. Pinkwater: I would just like to add my voice to the chorus of people crying out for the full text of Young Adults (all three stories). Tell your publisher to get all those out-of-print classics -including the legendary Afterlife Diet- back in print! Speaking of which -what is the address of your publisher? Robert Nifkin doesn’t even list the city it was published in, much less the mailing address. How can we send you stuff, and harass you through the mail if your publisher doesn’t even bother to give us a forwarding address?

Wyatt Troll

February 17, 1999

Hello mr Pinkwater

i have long worshiped the book that is “Devil in the Drain”, much the boy/person i try to be – not buying into the guilt thrown about by others, having the chutzpah to believe in myself.

i take photos and film things, although never for myself. i would like to converse about the possibilty of making a short film of this story. i would very much love to do this. if this is at all possible… …thank you very much, wyatt troll

Paul & Ramona Banik

February 14, 1999

Hello from shelby mt some where in the out back my husband and I love any thing that you read. it makes our whole week and hate when we don’t get to hear you. We would love to get t-shits and coffe mugs that you might have and if we could get a picture of youself and Chairty. that you for taking the time to read this lots of love and good times and be good.

Tristan Tzara

February 8, 1999

Just out of curiosity, is there any chance of the dAdA boys in Collitch ever becoming an actual *gasp* novel? Or was that just a nasty trick to make those of us who got Young Adults go out and buy all your other books in search of further narration by the ever charming Charles the Cat?

Either way, thank you, oh great coffee-mill, for significantly lowering the dullness of reality.

The Ever-Likeable Tristan Tzara

Christel Gause

February 5, 1999

Hey. I want to ask you for your opinion on this recccuring dream I’m having, because it’s probably your fault. At the beginning of the dream I have a large tank of lizards in my house. It’s like 300 gallon rectangular oblong one, and it’s got about fifty lizards in it. All different kinds, iguanas, komodo dragons, geckos, monitors, anoles, chameleons, skinks, horny toads, all kinds. And then I’ll turn my back or leave the room and sometimes I hear a crash, then a moment later I’ll see a flash of green as they all run down the hall past me in some sort of Mongol horde. They’re all running really fast and staying together in a herd. When I try to catch them they scatter, hide or outrun me. I get very angry and frustrated at them, and I fear the moment my mom arrives home to find renegade lizards. Then I wake up. I have this dream at least once a week, or as part of another dream.

Also, my house is alot bigger in the dream than it really is, and I don’t live with my mom. What do you think?

Rosemary Caspar

February 3, 1999

Dear Mr. Pinkwater:

My whole family has enjoyed reading your books, beginning with The Big Orange Splot and Wuggie Norple to Lizard Music and beyond. I also am a teacher of young children and would like to be share these stories with the budding readers I work with. We have lost our copy of Wuggie Norple and have not been able to find one in the stores or through the big internet book sellers. Is there some way we can get it?

Hoping to hear from you soon,

Rosemary Caspar

Oovnik

February 3, 1999

Hey, remember me? I joined the Wild Dada Duckettes a while ago. I have decided that my Dada name will be “The Vegitarian Velociraptor.” I also found an interesting avocado fact that neither Osgood Sigerson or Filliping Hades Terwilliger know- members of the parrot family can eat anything humans eat, except avocados. I don’t know why, but avocados are poisonous to parrots and can kill them. Tell Detective Sigerson and Dr. Terwilliger for me, please.

Kranzie105

January 28, 1999

I confess to never having heard of you (gulp)! But I need your help. My daughter is art major (jr. year) searching for info on Marc Burckhardt, illustrator. She found a small reference to him in Forbes ASAP mentioning your book, The Afterlife Diet. Can you somehow tell her how to get in touch?

This is for a project she has going. If you can help a young artist, I may just have to admit (being slightly overweight, ha) to being intrigued by the information on your website. Perhaps even enough to read something by you. Thanks!

Oswald Klein

January 27, 1999

Mr. Pinkwater:

I wrote to the NPR station here in Philadelphia (WHYY-FM) and asked them to pick up Chinwag Theater. I received a response from Mr. Kingsley Smith, the Program Director. He wrote that the station had not been approached by you or NPR to broadcast the show, but he was willing to take a serious look at it. Perhaps your representative could contact the station.

I would like to be able to listen to your show with my children, who are fans of yours.

Norman Ramsey

January 26, 1999

Dear Twisted Genius and Ace Dog Man:

Your books are great fun, especially to those of us who must be forced to admit being grownups. I no longer remember how I first discovered you, but I introduced you to my wife by reading _Lizard Music_ aloud. A few years later, as a Christmas present while she was away at school, I gave her tapes of me reading _The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death_. It was one of her favorites ever. So suffice it to say we are a Pinkwater family.

What I am really writing about, however, is Norb. I *loved* Norb. In his defense, I wrote letters to the editor of the Trenton Times. One was even published. But it was not enough. Then, five years later, at a science-fiction convention, I was lucky enough to find the cheesy MU Press edition of the dailies, which I cherish even though the damn pages are falling out. Then, ten years later, just the other day, as I was wandering about the city hoping for a glimpse of the Chicken Man, it hit me. Larson has retired. Watterson is in seclusion. *Now* is the time for a revival of Norb. He was never more needed than today—the comics page is a wasteland of normality. The only strip with pretensions to the unusual is unfunny and badly drawn.

What would it take to lure you and Auth back into the fray?

I’m sure no sensible person in your position would get involved with the newspaper syndicates again. But what about Internet distribution? At one time, people were quite interested in distributing comics via electronic mail, by subscription. I may still know such people. Can you imagine a scenario by which Norb might be brought back?

Norman Ramsey

P.S. I’m envious that you got to meet Captain Haggerty. I loved his book with Carol Lea Benjamin.

Jeff

January 26, 1999

Hello, Mr. Pinkwater. I have an extra copy of “The Afterlife Diet,” and you may have it if you like, since you bewhined the fact that you had so few. The reason I bought two is that one didn’t cost enough. This was a while back. They were on the sale shelf in the big book emporium for $4.98 each. So even my stingy nature has little compunction in sending you one for free, especially when it is prompted by the few remaining parts which exhibit the symptoms of “hero worship.”

I suppose I’ll need your address, or the address of the webmaster here (or is that websmith?), who can forward it.

Nat

January 17, 1999

In reply to your reply to my message, I didn’t mention the bookdealer’s name out of respect to you; the man whom I by most all of my books from is a used book dealer. Nothing at all embarrassing in his profession, of course, but as these books are rather recent, I didn’t want to mention the fact that, for me to have gotten them secondhand, they first were discarded by some unknown illiterate . . .

But in any case, I live deep in the mountains of Northeastern Pennsylvania, where books, when sold at all, are vended on the walmart plan, i.e. like soap—fine if you’re in need of it, but nothing beyond the latest, most popular brands, all packaged in nice, salable hunks. This all serves to explain why I travel 35 miles or so to Allentown, to

Another Story, 100 North Ninth Street, Allentown, Penna. 18102 (610) 435-4433, where the owner, John Furphy, while irascible, knows his stock, and where you’re apt to find almost everything, sooner or later. I can find more books of use to me there in one trip, than I can find in one year at any national chain bookstore, if only by chance.

Word handyman works for me; perhaps Wordsmith is a little too high-flown, or has become less useful through misuse.

N. M. Lucas, Jr.

Nat

January 15, 1999

Just when I had begun to despair of any new fiction that was worthwhile reading, I came upon a copy of “Fishwhistle” in my local book dealer (blest be his establishment, and may his tomes remain free of silverfish!), this was shortly followed by the acquisition of “Chicago Days, Hoboken Nights”. I just finished “The Afterlife Diet”—all enjoyable books.

I have heard the term “Wordsmith” bandied about by people who neither

read, nor would be able to define the term if asked to do so. I have seen blacksmiths capable both of crafting enduring articles, and those pretty items that are so nice to have around, just as enduring or utilitarian as a horseshoe, perhaps, but so delicate and pleasing to the eye, nonetheless. It was a pleasure to watch them at their craft. They were master craftsmen at their occupation. . .

Within this definition, I see you as a Wordsmith, of an ever diminishing guild, who crafts fine articles, such as those in “Smithsonian”, and books that are both a pleasure to read, and a joy to introduce to my friends.. You are very good at what you do.