On "You Thrive Now" by Jordan Rossen and Paul Rossen (4928 words) ***

Vella is shaking, and so is her mom. Her mom is in an advanced state of Parkinson's, and Vella, not quite forty, fears that she is on her way toward the same. Meanwhile, she works trying to sell subscriptions to a theater, thinking back on a past in which she was sort of an actress, a past in which she might have had love, and trying to piece together what little of life might remain for her in the future. Settle for an alcoholic boyfriend? Sing for a convalescent home? Her mom's boyfriend seems to be doing much the same, clinging on to the memory of her mom more that the sick woman herself. Read the story here at Baltimore Review.

On "Winner Take Nothing" by Philip Gardner (5849 words) ***

So the story seems a bit far-fetched--it's still good reading. The narrator is a musician whose band played around a bit in a not-so-distant past, played around enough that the musician has a paternity suit on his hands from a woman he can't remember. This is a tale that, like it's title, focuses on some not so well-off segments of society, everyone just getting by. Read it here at the Baltimore Review.