That time of year again: The Great Old Pumpkin, by John Aegard

As Halloween fast approaches, it is time again for one of my favorite stories:

Strange Horizons Fiction: The Great Old Pumpkin, by John Aegard:

As you are no doubt aware, I am the issue of solid Dutch stock—the prosperous Van Pelt family of St. Paul. Mine was a comfortable and happy childhood, and I spent much of it in the devoted service of the Great Old Pumpkin. For him, I cultivated an annual pumpkin patch—mostly Autumn Gold and Big Max, as I thought he would find the Atlantic Giants tacky. I also evangelized him in the community, relating the tale of how, every year on Hallowmas Eve, the day when the spiritual most strongly encroaches on the substantial, this mightiest of gourds would rise to revel across the world with the most sincere of his adorers. My neighbors were understandably skeptical; after all, not once had this superbeing ever chosen to grace my pumpkin patch or any other place in our town. I vowed that I would coax him into my backyard, and I set out in the manner of a learned man to discover how I might do this.

This eldritch horror is the epic tale of one Linus Van Pelt, friend of Charlie Brown, admirer of security blankets, and once devotee to the Great Pumpkin... Beware, His tale may strike terror into the hearts of any who venture into the darkness on All Hallows Eve.

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