The World's Finest Mystery And Crime Stories by
Gorman,E.& GreenBerg
pbk out November 04
(Forge)
This is the fifth annual collection in the World's Finest series and as usual
it doesn't disappoint. The book opens with reports about the state of
mystery writing in America, Canada, Germany and Great Britain and
includes details of other notable anthologies.
The first story is from award-winning writer Kristine Kathryn Rusch and
starts with the intriguing line `Every woman tolerates misogyny.' But the
central protagonist, Grace, eventually tolerates very little, and there's a
nice twist in the tale. The second story, by Doug Allyn, won the Ellery
Queen Readers Award for 2003. You get the picture. Many of these
stories are from prize winning scribes.
All of the stories were published in 2003, though they hail from a wide
variety of sources, everything from crossgenre and crime magazines to
author's collections. My own story Starting Over first appeared in the
CWA anthology Green For Danger and is a humorous expose of
prisoners on parole.
Several of the authors also use humour in the treatment of their stories.
Antony Mann's hero is a writer in search of originality, a difficult thing to
achieve in those days when every historical era and career choice has
already been claimed by a series character. Elaine Viets story Red Meat is
even funnier with its intro of `Ashley had a body to die for, and I should
know. I'm on death row because of her.'
Other stories have a wonderful edgy feel, including Joyce Carol Oates
classic The Hunter where Liam Gavin, abandoned by his young mother at
birth, is attracted to Hannah with her `body lean as a boy's' who he
believes doesn't have a child's soul.
Editors Ed Gorman and Martin Greenberg have written thirty two detail-
packed author biographies, and with contemporary, noir, historical and
just plain uncategorisable stories stretching to a total of 460 pages, there's
surely something for everyone.
The World's Finest Mystery And Crime Stories by
Gorman,E.& GreenBerg
