A writer friend mentioned that zombies were the next hot protagonists for romance novels and I tried to get my head around the idea of anyone romancing a zombie. First I pictured meeting a zombie. What's the pick-up line? Literally. Maybe, "Excuse me, you seem to have dropped something. Is that your ear on the floor?"

Next, what do I say to pursue the relationship after the zombie picks up his ear (you didn't think I would pick it up, did you? Ick.) "I'm having a group of friends over on Saturday to do craft projects. We have a variety of strong glues."

Or, to check his food preferences, I could say, "I am having a party for a bunch of my brainless friends. Would you like to join us?" If he answers, "Nothing there I want," I have to consider that a strong and scary clue.

After considering all the possibilities, the best I could do was a very short story. It sold to Pill Hill Press for their Rotting Tales Anthology. And now it is included in my Nine Horoscope-in-Catsup collection. Most of the stories in this ebook were originally published in magazines or anthologies.

My zombie story is titled Lorna Doomed because if I can't use a pun for a zombie story, where can I use one? I thought about writing a complete novel of Lorna's sorrows, but such difficult thinking gave me a migraine and I had to give up. Sorry, Lorna.

The other spooky story in the collection is Apprentice Gone Bad, or at least, the sorcerer ends up in a place nobody wants to be. The rest of the stories aren't scary, but they do deal with a fortuneteller, a beheader, a shapechanger, a vampire, and a smash wizard, all normal folks you might meet in your own neighborhood.