Read: "Damn Near Dead" edited by Duane Swierzynski

Read: Damn Near Dead edited by Duane Swierzynski, 2006, 0976715759.

Pretty good. A collection of original short stories with elderly protagonists. Bill Crider has a story in here. Crider says, "Jump!" and I say "How High?".

Some of these were really good stories. Offhand I remember the story by Laura Lippman as being good but there is not a dog anywhere in the collection. I was just looking through to try and remember the best ones but they are all dang good so I won't bother listing any in particular.

I most liked the stories that connected the elderly person's past with their present; old secrets coming out, or old regrets providing current motivation. Those stories let me know a lot more about the characters.

Too bad the cover and layout are not up to snuff. The cover and illustrations are not amateurish but do make me think "self-published". That's not good. Also, I just noticed that the cover illustration is not a old guy dancing with a surprised young gal. It's an old guy raising the gal's hand high - to the edge of the cover - to hit a revolver out of her hand.