As a whole, the stories in the collection range from mediocre, to good. But there were no stand out stories. My favourite is "A Foreign Country".

A Foreign Country - Wayne Wightman. A fun story about an person running for president and the journalist who is assigned to report on him. I really liked this one. Its nice, dark, funny, and well written.

Falling Angel - Eugene Mirabelli. An odd story about an angel who may (or may not have) fallen from heaven. A bit disturbing, but mostly annoying

Leave - Robert Reed. A war is being fought somewhere not on else. Humans are recruited - but what happens to the families when a person is selected? This one was sad.

The Alarming Letters From Scottsdale - Warner Law. Mystery writers turns to a dog for support after his wife dies - all is not as it seems. I liked this one - it turns into a satisfying revenge story.

A Skeptical Spirit - Albert E. Cowdrey. A story about a soul, stuck in a belief that isn't true. Screws up a researchers study. Cute, mostly unremarkable

How the Day Runs Down - John Langan. Zombie story. Takes an odd turn, but still fairly average. ( )

This was my last issue of Fantasy & Science fiction. It wasn't because I didn't enjoy the magazine. It is more that I have very limited shelf space on my physical bookshelves, so I had to make a decision to cut out extraneous fillers. So, I decided to stop buying Fantasy & Science Fiction, as that decreased my shelf space by about 1 cm every month.

This issue, I must say, had two stories that really jumped out. And one was a reprint. The other was a story that was "reprinted" (before it was published in the magazine) in John Joseph Adams' anthology The Living Dead. Sad, but true.

A Foreign Country is about a third-party candidate during the elections. He doesn't do much but go to bumblescum towns and press the flesh. He's got at most 13% of the vote at any given time. But then, miraculously, he wins. All around him, people who are violent naysayers mysteriously disappear. His confidant, formerly a journalist assigned to follow him, acts as the link between the man (if that's really what he is) and everybody who hasn't disappeared. The thing is, though, hardly anybody seems to mind, which leads one to wonder if that too is a product of whatever's causing people to disappear. (3 stars)

Leave is a story critical of war, especially of young people with hardly any interest or stake in the trivial wars that seem to plague our world. A man's son disappears, and they're wondering if he just ran off, or if he enlisted himself into the army of some extra terrestrial race that has a recruitment office on Earth (like the ones they have at the mall, only under ground and run by extraterrestrials). If he did enlist, and if he does make it past basic training, he's going to be gone most of his life, and if he survives, he'll come back, battered, scarred, and maybe even missing some pieces; but he'll also have a bag of loot, which may or may not set him for life. It's a rush to find him before the scheduled departure of the next batch of troops. (3 stars)

A Skeptical Spirit is yet another story by Cowdrey set in Post-Katrina New Orleans. Personally, I'm sick of hearing about post-Katrina New Orleans. Sure, some people's houses were destroyed, and many were relocated to my fine city (and on some totally unrelated matter, the criminal activity increased), but really, now, it was close to four years ago. Can we just throw in the towel and worry about bigger issues, like, why people are moving back to New Orleans. But I digress. This story is about a small town nearby in which just about every house is haunted, but one. The owner desperately wants a haunting, so he hires a medium (also his cleaning lady) to find out why. Apparently, the last owner was a skeptic, and disbelieved in ghosts, which caused other spirits to avoid the house perpetually. Additionally, his spirit refuses to acknowledge that he's dead, and that he should move on. Though, there's more than one way to dig up the dead. (3 stars)

How the Day Runs Down is like Our Town with zombies. This is definitely the most creative piece in the issue, and if the rest of the stories in The Living Dead are anything like it, I definitely think I'll be picking myself up a copy. Written like a play, it chronicles the stories of several individuals in a small town outside of NYC around the time of a zombie infestation. Wonderful! (5 stars)

Falling Angel could have been written by an adolescent male and have the exact same depth, plot, and quite possibly wording. (2 stars)

The Alarming Letters from Scottsdale is the classic reprint in this issue. Originally published in 1973, this tells the story of a popular pulp author who gets a dog that reminds him of his late friend, Dashell Hammett. He then teaches the dog to type, rewarding him with unhealthy treats. His publisher gets concerned, as he seems to be personifying the dog in his letters, and tries desperately to help him. This story has a wonderful twist ending, and I do wish that F&SF would buy more stories like this (and like HtDRD), as this story was definitely a breath a fresh air, which is odd, as it's over 35 years old. (4 stars)

Best in show: How the Day Runs Down. Though Scottsdale was a breath of fresh air, sometimes a breath of zombie-scented air is what you need. Of course, I do have a soft spot in my heart for the shambling hordes of the undead. ( )

A decent issue. The strongest story is easily John Langan's "How the Day Runs Down".

Contents:
"A Foreign Country" - Wayne Wightman 3/5
A man with the power to wish away bad people becomes President. Amusing but minor.
"Falling Angel" - Eugene Mirabelli 3/5
An angel falls into a slacker's apartment.
"Leave" - Robert Reed 3/5
A boy is recruited to fight in an alien war.
"The Alarming Letters from Scottsdale" - Warner Law 3/5
Reprint from 1973. A mystery writer adopts an unusual dog.
"A Skeptical Spirit" - Albert E. Cowdrey 3.5/5
The ghost of an atheist skeptic scares other ghosts away from an old house. Entertaining but minor.
"How the Day Runs Down" - John Langan 4.5/5
The zombie apocalypse told in the style of "Our Town". A unique twist on the concept. ( )