Stories read aloud over the radio are meant to be heard and then gone, evaporating into the airwaves, and remaining alive in the listener’s memory alone. But not these stories. WALT & STUMPY: ADVENTURES OF A MAN AND HIS SQUIRREL, by Mark S. Haman, has become a book, and in doing so the collected works achieve a certain amount of immortality. WALT & STUMPY is being published this month by Small Batch Books, based in Amherst, Massachusetts, and is available for purchase on Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble. com, and other online booksellers as well as at select independently owned bookstores in southern New Hampshire and eastern Massachusetts.

In the forty-six short stories that Mark Haman (a.k.a. “Doc”) originally wrote to read aloud over the air on his radio show, The Doctor Is In, the characters come to life on the page, starting with Walt Walthers, elderly weather watcher, and his rascally roommate, Stumpy the stub-tailed gray squirrel. From their cozy cabin on Kibbee Pond, the two buddies embark on adventures that include exploratory boat rides in Walt’s skiff, Nelly, as well as road trips in Lulu, the 1960 Chevy pickup, to such exciting events as Squannacook Squealing Squirrels baseball games, annual pie-baking contests, riverside picnics, and local music concerts. Present to enjoy Walt’s masterful storytelling, subtle wit, and legendary sour cream-blueberry muffins are his new neighbors, almost-six-year-old Tony Riggetti and his mom, Amy, as well as old friends Todd Jormonen, the string-playing handyman and snowplow driver, and Arlene Tosh, Walt’s high school crush from decades earlier, who brings along her goofy elephantine yellow Lab, Big Bruno.

Readers of all ages can experience a simpler way of living as Walt and Stumpy spend their days marveling in the small wonders of the natural world, savoring time spent among friends, and never taking themselves too seriously.