John Hartig

From the Future to the Pearly Gates John Hartig

Saint Peter has a time keeping "The Roll up yonder." He gets flustered when several violinists pop up in front of his Pearly Gates. He hopes it's not a repeat of what he experienced previously with a bunch of Popes and painters who got into a heated argument. There is also a Novella of Jean-Marie Leclair who was a violinist of the 18th century and who got stabbed to death in front of his house. Nobody was ever arrested. This is a collection of short stories, not just about Saint Peter and his crowd control up there, but recalls the aging and death of several people close to me, my mother, Rosa Hartig, my neighbour, Wilma de Jager, and an aging friend, Harry Rittenhouse. And oh yes, I threw in a novella about Jean-Marie Leclair who was stabbed to death in front of his door in 1764. There goes all the hours he put into violin practice! I mixed this old murder mystery up with Battle of the Violins where Captain James T, Kirk of the Enterprise is assigned to bring 6 top violinists back to the future in the year 2328 for a fiddle contest at the Hollywood Bowl.