"Don't Laugh - This Could Have Been Your Life" is a compilation of short fiction about some interesting, and for the most part, unusual events and some equally unusual characters. Some of the characters in this volume are laughably strange and others sadly odd. But none of the characters or events are so out of the ordinary as to not exist. They are all very real. None are fantasies of a distorted, overly creative mind struggling to write something new and different. I am, more or less, just reporting life as I did when I worked for the local newspaper. It is not difficult for me to write stories like these, since everyone I have ever encountered on this planet is, in my opinion, sick, diseased, mentally ill or totally out of their mind. It is all just a matter of degree of seriousness. I do not exclude myself from this intellectual observation, nor do I exclude myself from my analysis and recorded documentation. I have been putting the pieces of my personal lunacy together for as long as I can remember. It is all documented in many of my other works. If I were to meet you and we were to become friends, it would not be long before I will have discovered that you are basically insane, and I would be writing a story concerning what I see as your problem. I might change your name to disguise your identity but not always - especially if you are already dead.
About the Author: Richard Edward Noble was raised in Lawrence, Massachusetts. He attended St. Rita's grammar school in Lawrence, Central Catholic high school also in Lawrence, Northern Essex Community College in Haverhill and Merrimack College in North Andover. His mother and father and grandparents - on both sides of the family - were Lawrence textile workers. Richard lived in Lawrence until the age of twenty-seven and then migrated to Fort Lauderdale, Florida where he met his wife Carol. Richard and Carol have been a team for over forty years. Richard is now retired and working as a writer. He writes fiction, non-fiction, creative non-fiction poetry, essays and book reviews. He published a column in a local newspaper. In 2007 he received a first place award for humor from the Florida Press Association for this column. Richard has a variety of interests - philosophy, history, politics, the American and world labor movements, economics, poetry, music, biography, autobiography and the unique history of Lawrence, Massachusetts.