How Steve Weinstein Turns a Worried Mother Into the Engine of the Story in Nuts To You
A psychology professor picks up his phone and hears his mother shout his name twice. Somewhere in Queens, his father has declared war on a squirrel.
That is how the second half of the story begins in Steve Weinstein’s comic novel Nuts To You. Miriam Ballnick tries every delaying tactic she knows. She asks about his teaching job, she pauses for effect, and she starts with her favorite word, “Well,” which is usually the preamble to bad news. Richard has learned to wait out his mother’s evasions, and he knows that a little patience will get the story out of her. When it finally arrives, the news concerns his father, his tomatoes, and a growing population of squirrels.
A phone call can rearrange a whole semester: What would you do if a parent’s strangest problem became yours?
The Worst-Case Scenario That Wasn’t
Richard fears the worst. His first thought is illness, and his second is his father’s memory, since the flashes of forgetfulness have become more frequent, like cerebral lightning bolts. Instead, Miriam explains that a few months ago, at breakfast, Pincus spotted squirrels in his garden and has been on a rampage ever since. He has declared war; he takes it personally, and he believes the squirrels have a vendetta against him and are inviting friends and family to destroy his prized vegetables. Richard is relieved and annoyed in equal measure.
His confidence that the animal whisperer is harmless is a reasonable psychological guess. She will probably stop by, listen to his father’s story, pretend to talk to the squirrels, and that will be that. Readers who know how such predictions tend to age in a comic novel will smile. Richard has taught perception for years, and it has not yet taught him to distrust his own forecasts.
Miriam is not finished. Pincus owns an old Daisy BB gun from a flea market that hardly works, and she is afraid he will buy one that does. He has been to the veterans’ club, where Ernie told her everything and suggested his niece, an animal whisperer or, as Miriam puts it, a sorcerer. Richard offers calm, practical advice. Make sure his father does not give the woman any money or sign a payment plan, and remember that his father is no longer in the courtroom.
An Enemy Called the Big O
Then comes the part that truly frightens Miriam. While looking for advice, Pincus wandered onto a website for animal-protection activists and told them exactly what he thought of squirrels. One of the members, who goes by the name The Big O, promised to kill Pincus before allowing him to touch a hair on any of them. The group organizes protests and demonstrations, has been known to break into shelters and zoos and release squirrels and raccoons, and even sells T-shirts to raise money.
Richard laughs at first. His father wants to kill the squirrels, and he has found a website that wants to protect them. His mother does not laugh. The Big O, she fears, might find out where they live. Weinstein plays the conversation like a comedy of errors, but the anxiety in Miriam’s voice is real, and so is Richard’s sense that a stubborn father and an angry stranger make a dangerous pair.
- Is a threat funny when it arrives by email, or only when it stays there?
- How far will a person go to defend what he loves?
A Mother Knows Which Button to Push
Miriam’s request is careful. Maybe during his school break Richard can come up, talk with his father in person, read the threatening emails, and make sure Ernie’s niece is not taking advantage of him. She reminds him that his father is vulnerable right now. Then she plays her best card. “You could use some of your psychology on him,” she says. “You’re so good at it, I heard.” It is a perfect line, delivered with the confidence of a woman who knows exactly what her son wants to hear.
The professor of perception can see what is happening and agrees anyway. His father is as stubborn as a six-year-old passing a toy store at Christmas, and he is getting older faster than he wants to admit. Easter vacation is around the corner, so Richard decides to use his best persuasive logic to bring his father back to a comfortable spot on the reality scale, whether the old man likes it or not.
The Trip Nobody Planned
What Richard does not know is how much trouble one visit can hold. His plans for spring break, a pile of brochures for vacation islands and a daydream about inviting Tina along, are set aside. Being somewhat optimistic, which is what he teaches his students, he tells himself that it may be for the best. Maybe fate is sending him home to be a mediator between his father, the persistent squirrels, and, as the narrator puts it with no pun intended, a nut job from the animal-rights group.
Nuts To You, available on October 31, 2026, follows Richard from a Goathead lecture hall to a Queens backyard, where the small family problem turns out to be much larger than a phone call can hold. The squirrels are only part of it. A worried mother, a proud father, and a professor who teaches perception all have something to learn about seeing what is right in front of them.
A mother can start with one word…
A father can start a war over tomatoes…
A son can be pulled home by both…
In Nuts To You, one phone call is all it takes to bring a whole family back together!
Author Name: Steve Weinstein; Book Title: Nuts To You
Published By: Author Path Publishers
