Everything checked out fine.

You made a sweep of the house at bedtime, nothing amiss. Security, check. No problems, check, and you locked the door.

Didn’t you? When you jolted awake at three o’dark in the morning, hearing something that wasn’t there, you wondered. Are you alone? Safe? Or, as in the new book “This House is Haunted” by John Boyne (c.2013, Other Press, $14.95, 293 pages), do you have unseen company?

Charles Dickens killed her father.

There are too many people on the road.

That’s what you thought on your commute today. Too many cars, too much traffic and, while you’re on that rant, crowds seem to grow bigger each year, too. Nobody stays home any more; or at least that’s how it seems.

Seven billion people in the world and they all have to go where you are. And in the new book “Countdown” by Alan Weisman (c.2013, Little, Brown, $28, 528 pages), you’ll see that it’s going to get worse …

When you’re gone, you’ll leave behind many important things.

There’ll be photos and memorabilia, money, bric-a-brac, and property to divvy up. Great-grandma’s china goes here, your mother’s jewelry there, and a cherished belonging of your father’s will become someone else’s cherished belonging.

When you’re dead and gone, you’ll leave many things behind because you can’t take them with you — although, in the new novel “The Casual Vacancy” by J.K. Rowling (c.2012, Little, Brown, $35, 503 pages), some wished that Barry Fairbrother had.