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We are pleased to bring our readers another collection of fresh new short stories from emerging authors. The tales in this volume draw from several different literary traditions-humor to horror, romance to lament. Our collection opens with Patricia Florio's tale of gambling, addiction, and financial ruin. "All in the Game" helps us understand the lingering appeal of games of chance-in spite of their obvious financial and emotional costs. Florio doesn't explain why people roll the dice, spin the roulette wheel or flip the next card, but she allows the reader to participate in the gambler's emotional rush as the game transpires. Adam Russ's "Spill in the Aisle" also allows the reader to empathize with a character's lamentable decisions. Russ's sad and lonely lead character looks up from a spill in the local drugstore to see his long lost love, an experience that leaves him looking back on past-but constantly revisited-decisions. The memories conjured up in "A Wrestler and a Coach" are less weathered, but equally poignant, as Everett Cooney revisits the awkward relationship between a high school athlete and his former coach. Murder in an odd location, that's what Marcella Wachtel's "Intermission" provides. Her socially invisible witness observes an ill-fated love triangle spill one another's blood in an upscale theatre. Lynn Marie Penedo's "Until By Death We Part" allows the reader to share in a neglected spouse's secret glee over the death of a spouse. A husband, completely free from remorse, seeks to remain equally free from the law, while evading the police and curious co-workers. Readers looking for stories with fewer homicidal impulses will be inspired by Patricia Crandall's touching story of a family's rekindled love and their collective concern for a group of abandoned canines. Every dog lover-and many non-dog lovers-will root for the would-be saviors in "The Rescue." William Walz's "Far From Home" offers no physical rescues, but it does offer a profound and deeply engaging account of a dying man's journey back to the home of his youth. Walz's eloquent prose evokes a range of competing emotions, from aching sorrow to sincerest admiration-a tale of unsurpassed beauty and emotion. Readers with a taste for the warm blood of a good old-fashion vampire tale can sink their fangs into Michael Valko's "Bleeding Time." Valko's vampires travel through time to menace and deceive both their own kind and the humans upon whom they prey. Laurie Lamson's "Compliance Department" looks at predators of another type-the sort who routinely lurk around the offices of corporate America. Her characters have to practice deceptions of their own in order to survive the dangerous world of high finance.Don't try to predict what will eventually go into the stew in Cris Jolliff's "The Cauldron." This unpredictable twist on the children's classic of Hansel and Gretel will leave you thinking twice before you go into the woods alone again. And, finally, Bill Abrams's "Extreme Gardening" will leave you thinking twice before you go into your own backyard again. This amusing tale creates the new sport of extreme gardening. Readers will giggle over the stupid chances that all of us routinely take in our vain pursuit of a perfectly groomed landscape.As always, each of these stories has won our highly competitive monthly short story contest. We continue to be delighted to bring these emerging new authors to the attention of the reading public. Phyllis Scott, series editor