Richard M. (algernon99) -
This distinguished book is the result of the Mystery Writers of America's early 1980s effort to collect all the Very, Very Best mystery stories in history. They took a poll of the MWA membership, asking them to list their five favorite stories and authors in the field. The result is this anthology, containing the stories most popular among the professional writers in the field. For any reader or fan mystery stories, the stories and authors are instantly familiar. In fact, as I have been reading mystery anthologies almost exclusively for the last four years. In that process, I had already read all but two of these stories in other books. And those two are also in several other anthologies; but I just hadn't gotten to those books. One of these stories, Jacques Futrelle's "The Problem of Cell 13," appears in 15 -- yes fifteen! -- other books in my collection. Thomas Burke's "The Hands of Mr. Ottermole" appears in 11 of my other books. Fredric Brown's "Don't Look Behind You" is in 9 other books. Poe's "The Purloined Letter" is in 18 other books. The rest are similar, with the average being 7 or 8 other appearances each. You won't find a better book than this.
John B. (cwousn) -
This was a decent anthology featuring twenty stories from various eras. The book was published in 1984, so there are no contempory writers included. I had previously read approximately half the stories. I thought that the editor Bill Pronzini demonstrated a remarkable amount of chutzpah to include one of his stories in the volume. Granted, he has won many awards for various works but I didn't think that the sample incuded here was of the same quality as some of the other classics. Overall, I enjoyed the stories and would recommend the book.
