At this point, my favorite overall story is "A Few Good men" by David Nicholson. It is a story about your typical barbershop conversation between men about women and how to handle them relationship-wise: either as a fool or as player.
Another story I found interesting is an excerpt from the novel Yellow Moon by Jewell Parker Rhodes. It's a detective-mystery novel about vampires and I think reincarnation. I'm not sure. The excerpt was a little fuzzy, and probably wasn't the best selection to choose from the book -- the excerpt was mostly dialogue, a conversation with some key characters as how to track down this ghost of a vampire. I would much rather had read an excerpt with more physical action. But I'm interested in reading the full novel.
Then there's the story "The Torturer's Wife" by Thomas Glave. The story is a disturbing tale of the wife of some brutal military officer, who has sexual dreams featuring the corpses of the men her husband has had brutally slain. The prose is very dream-like and fluid, descriptive and haunting.
There are other stories that offer bits of excellence, but overall fall flat for me. I hope I find the second half of the book more entertaining and enjoyable.
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