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Stephen recently got over a nasty bout with cancer, and is now doing better than ever. He is a senior office administrator at a busy engineering firm, where he continues to write weekly time sheet poems to this day.
He is the author of Time Sheets: A Collection of Poems and This is How Much Oatmeal Loves You: A Collection of Stories, both of which were published in 2014. He is currently thinking about completing a short, absurd novel, although he has mixed feelings about that, as it sounds like a lot of work, and there is always the argument that it would just be easier not to do it.
Reviewed by Jack Magnus for Readers' Favorite
This is How Much Oatmeal Loves You: A Collection of Stories is written by Stephen R. Wagner. The stories are prefaced by two introductions which serve to introduce both the author and the genesis of most of the stories. They were written, as the author explains, for contests or for submission to various magazines. While one was selected as a finalist, none of them won any prizes or were accepted. Still, author Stephen R. Wagner loves these 'word soldiers' that he's created, and he's gathered them together into this collection. There are 30 stories in all, each independent of the one before or after, though many do refer to the author's cats and some to his kitchen appliances.
I normally harbor ill-feelings for introductions, and there's always the risk that a wordy or overly involved introduction will cause me to close the book unread. So I was a bit skeptical when I began reading the first of the two introductions to Stephen R. Wagner's This is How Much Oatmeal Loves You: A Collection of Stories. This author seemed to be taking some pretty serious risks. Then I started reading. He was, somehow, in the room talking to me in that first introduction. Intrigued, I started on the second and found again the author chatting away and preparing me for my upcoming visit to his world. Even before I began the stories, I was enchanted, mesmerized and captivated. Then I hit the stories. Some are grand; others fall a bit short of the mark; others will stay in my mind for some time...and that's not at all a bad thing. My favorite would have to be the story where a child's scribbled super-dog comes to life. Yes, these stories are odd and not a little off somehow, but you knew that going into the book based on its title. Venture on past those introductions, the stories are well worth the ride.
