Were you born in a barn? In other words, get in here and shut the door. Take your dirty shoes off before you walk on the clean floor. You might call your cat your “baby” and your dog is your “best friend” but really, were you born in a barn?…

Cupid can just take a hike. He’s messed up your life enough by now, and you’re not taking it anymore. That fat little cherub can just go away, vamoose, get lost, never again darken your doorstep with a quiver full of love arrows. No thanks, you’re already heading…

You’d need that pin to get in. Put it on your chest and you’d get access to an exclusive club. The pin tells the world what you did, that you were elite, that you acted with honor. If you earned the pin, you’d wear it with pride. In “Immortal Valor” by Robert Child, it’s a beribboned thing that you’d definitely deserved. Almost since…

Heavy sigh.  You need to watch your weight. There it is, the blunt, unavoidable truth, now that the holidays are over and the parties are done. You need to have cookie-calories shed, poundcake pounds lost, flan flab melted. Or you need to hide the scale in a…

And that’s the final word. Just a few lines, a handful of dates and names, an accomplishment or two, and then that’s it. You’ll be done, dead, end of story – or is it? Will you be remembered only by a few lines in a…

You barely made a sound until the lights were up. And then you roared. Your favorite band was about to come onstage and you, plus 14,999 of your best friends, were makin’ some noise, ready to sing along and dance, ready to feel the bass. Read “Rock Concert” by Marc Myers, and you’ll…

The storm’s a-coming. You can smell it in the air: rain’s on the way, maybe thunder, maybe more, but the high winds are what you hate. They make you run for shelter and pray hard. The storm’s a-coming, and in “Lightning Down” by Tom Clavin, it’s never…

All eyes are on you. Twelve of your peers have decided your fate, and you haven’t a clue what they’ll say. None of their faces are readable. Nobody’s smiling but then again, there are no scowls. Will they find this court case favorable for you,…

Pick a card. Any card. Don’t show it to anyone. Just look at it, quick, and put it back in the deck anywhere at random. Now think about that card. Think about the number, the suit, how many symbols were on it, the color, the shape. Concentrate…