Don't skip editor Timothy J. Lambert's introduction, in which, despite describing himself as someone whose "most successful relationship to date has been with my dog", he reveals himself to be an unreconstructed romantic.

And that's what this collection is all about: romance in its myriad forms, romance expected and unexpected, romance beginning, blooming and ending. The characters range from teenagers just coming out (Josh Helmin's Like No One's Watching) to the fifty-something men "like a quartet of maiden aunts" of Andrew Holleran's Two Kinds of Rapture. (And may I say here that this anthology has a nice mix of writers: "grand old men" of gay fiction such as Holleran and Felice Picano; younger, yet relatively established writers like Greg Herren and Rob Byrnes; and never-before-published authors like 'Nathan Burgoine (whose Heart just might break yours) .

Toss-up for best opening line:

"Ending up in the trunk of a car headed for Houston was not what Bobby'd had in mind when he came to New Orleans." (Trunk, by Trevor Healey)

"It was the morning after my boyfriend told me he wanted to seek freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ that I decided to knit the brain." (De Anima, by Joel Derfner)

'Fess up - you want to read both of those from the get-go, don't you? But read them all. I don't think there's a bad story in the bunch.