Kordel Lentine's stories all contain numerous hat tips and Easter eggs to various books, authors, etc. that he is either fond of or considers of significance to the stories. Some are just for fun and easy to find, like where he included “A113” in Beyond the Bowling Ball Bombing, which is the famous Easter egg that occurs in most Pixar movies. Others are more meaningful and harder to find, like the repeated hat tip to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy that occurs throughout the From Under the Sun trilogy, which none of his beta readers found.

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One meaningful example that he would like to share involves The Time Machine by H. G. Wells, which is not only an early forerunner in the science fiction genre but is also the first book about time travel that he ever read. Like “C. S. Lewis” and “J. R. R. Tolkien,” many people know the name but do not know what the famous initials stand for. It is his intentional tribute to “the Shakespeare of science fiction” that in From Under the Sun, Stanley’s full name includes “Herbert George” which is the “H” and “G” of H. G. Wells.

 

Another worthwhile example in From Under the Sun is that Terrance’s middle name is Walter. For parental brownie points, Kordel thought about keeping his mouth shut and letting everyone think he chose it in honor of his dad, whose first name is Walter. However, Kordel admits that he intentionally chose Terrance’s middle name from the short story, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. It is a story that he loved in high school and felt the name was appropriate for Terrance given his propensity for daydreaming.

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It is also significant that Terrance’s last name is “Brown.” This is an intentional hat tip to “Doc Brown” in the movie, Back to the Future, which is included in almost every “best of” list of time-travel movies ever made. Even if the movie treats time travel in a laughably illogical way, what better namesake for our hero than the man who turned a sports car into a time machine?

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As a certified public accountant (CPA) who frequently fantasizes about leaving his day job to become a full-time author, Kordel named Dusty’s accountant “Kenneth” in Ask Me “No” Questions, after Kenneth Gorelick, one of the most amazing accountant redirects of all time. After earning a degree in accounting and graduating magna cum laude, Mr. Gorelick abandoned his promising accounting career to play the saxophone. He is more commonly known by his fans as Kenny G.

 

Kordel's own list of hat tips and Easter eggs contain many not found here or in the back of each book. Some allude to personal or family matters that would not mean anything to the average reader, but there are many more that general readers could identify and appreciate. If you find any not listed on the Hat Tips & Easter Eggs page of each book, please CONTACT KORDEL and let him know. He would be interested to hear which ones people have found—particularly the hat tip to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which no one has told him that they have found yet.