Ask any writer his or her favorite story, and you’ll get a question right back: “Mine or somebody else’s?” The creator of Bernie Rhodenbarr (The Burglar in the Rye, p. 836, etc.) and of Matthew Scudder (Everybody Dies, 1998, etc.) asked nine of his colleagues to answer both questions, and the result is nine pairs of suspense yarns with little in common but excellence. Some of the choices show affinities between authors and their models (Tony Hillerman and Joe Gores, Peter Lovesey and Donald E. Westlake, Ed Gorman and Stephen Crane) or reveal what writers value most about their own work (Joan Hess’s atypically unnerving “Another Room” and Judith Garner’s equally nightmarish “Trick or Treat”). But many choices are just plain surprising—Stephen King picks Joyce Carol Oates, Bill Pronzini picks Benjamin Appel, editor Block picks John O’Hara (the little-known noir scorcher “In a Grove”). Two complaints: Harlan Ellison’s long headnote makes his contribution (“Tired Old Man”) unnecessary; and five of the stories are so well-known you won’t even need to be told their authors: “First Lead Gasser,” “Goodbye, Pops,” “The Problem of Cell 13,” “August Heat,” and “The Blue Hotel.” A first-rate collection of stories that deserve their reputation.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-425-17031-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A middling mystery with telling historical details and the usual pleasures provided by the regulars’ interpersonal dynamics.
A plucky group of early-20th-century detectives (Murder on Trinity Place, 2019, etc.) takes on the Black Hand.
The leads include Frank Malloy and Gino Donatelli, former police officers who started a detective agency after an unexpected legacy made Malloy a wealthy man; Malloy’s wife, Sarah, the daughter of a wealthy society family who runs a maternity clinic for the poor; and their nanny, Maeve, a budding sleuth who works in Malloy’s office. All of them leap to attention when Gino’s sister-in-law Teodora reports that Jane Harding, a worker at the settlement house where Teo volunteers, has been kidnapped by the Black Hand, who are notorious for abducting the wives and children of anyone who can afford to pay ransom. The New York Police Department is corrupt, and the local Italian immigrants never report crimes. Mr. McWilliam, who runs the settlement house, had asked Jane to marry him, but she’d asked him to allow her to experience more of the single life before deciding. Seeking clues, Sarah visits Mrs. Cassidi, an earlier kidnapping victim who’s refused to talk to anyone, in hopes that her nursing experience and sympathetic manner will get results. Mrs. Cassidi admits to being raped but knows little about where she was held captive, a quiet place in a house where she could hear children. Soon after Nunzio Esposito, a leader of the Black Hand, tells Malloy that no one’s been taken from the settlement house, Jane suddenly reappears but refuses to discuss where she’s been. Lisa Prince, Jane’s well-to-do cousin, reluctantly agrees to take her in even though Jane’s jealous of her wealth and can be unpleasant to deal with. When Esposito’s found murdered in a flat he rented for his mistress, Gino, who’s just arrived on the scene, is arrested. Now the clever sleuths must solve both the murder and the abductions to clear Gino’s name.
A middling mystery with telling historical details and the usual pleasures provided by the regulars’ interpersonal dynamics.Pub Date: April 28, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-0574-4
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
This ran in the S.E.P. and resulted in more demands for the story in book form than ever recorded. Well, here it is and it is a honey. Imagine ten people, not knowing each other, not knowing why they were invited on a certain island house-party, not knowing their hosts. Then imagine them dead, one by one, until none remained alive, nor any clue to the murderer. Grand suspense, a unique trick, expertly handled.
Pub Date: Feb. 21, 1939
ISBN: 0062073478
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1939
SEEN & HEARD
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