Books with title The Fizziness Business

A short story (4,000 words) for lovers of humorous fantasy.Renardo and his brothers are up to their eyeballs in debt, with one last chance to save their merchant business (and their gonads) from the moneylender. The great city of Tebos is holding its Festival of Song in three days’ time, and they have a wagonload of songbirds to sell.There’s just one large, man-eating problem: the bored sphinx who guards the city’s gates, and her deadly riddle game. Renardo doesn’t even want to be a merchant, but somehow it falls to him to outwit the sphinx. No pressure. All he has to do is come up with an unanswerable riddle.

A short story: Five-year-old Mandy lives in rural New Mexico with her mother and father. While her mother cooks and cleans and her father works the fields, lonely Mandy meanders through the long days.One morning she finds a bear cub curled upon her bedroom floor. Finally, a friend to play with! But Mandy's aunt does not approve of the friendship and encourages Mandy's parents to get rid of the bear. Mandy and the bear must find a way to stay together without her parents knowing.