Killer Year: A Criminal Anthology

Now this book is definitely worth. . .well, maybe not dying for, but certainly the price of admission. I am a long time aficionado of short crime stories, cutting my teeth on borrowed Alfred Hitchcock collections and treasuring all of John D. MacDonald's early works -- but it is rare for me to find a compilation that has more than one or maybe two memorable pieces. This book is a find.

With an introduction by Lee Child and an afterword by Laura Lippman, the reader already knows some treats are in store between these covers. I've rarely been so entertained by a short story collection. From the perfect jewel of "A Perfect Gentleman" to the poignant "Crime of My Life", the book is full of exquisite little gems, and writers to keep an eye show more on.

Very highly recommended. show less

Meh.

It's a nice concept - a group of sucessful crime writers, have agreed to be mentors to a group of up and coming new writers. Most have already published a debut novel, and these are short stories in a similar vein. None of the famous authors have included any of their work, just a brief paragraph of introduction. And while all of the short stories were OK, none were bad, equally none were really that gripping either. Granted a short crime story is a very hard format to pull off well. Crime storioes work from detailed clues, a building of suspense and tension, and a twisted ending, or clever deduction work. All of these bar the twisted ending, take a lot of prose to establish - hence we have a collection of stories all following a show more similar theme - the unreliable narrator - without any of the talent that say Ronald Dahl or Forseyth manages.

The stories are set in various US locales and times, from mid Westerns to modern cities. Mostly they feature teenagers, but there are a few cops and PIs in there too, and as athe title suggets lots of deaths and murders, from the victims POV but also the murderers, and the detective. A smattering of sex and a bit of violence, but again nothing particularly noteworthy.

None of the stories stood out individually enough for me remember them by author or by title, which is probably condemnation enough. show less

I am so saddened by this collection. This is one that I had on my shelf for a little while to read. I finally picked it up not expecting to enjoy every story but the majority. This is because it featured some of my favorite authors as well as the genre of this collection is right up my book reading alley. I read the first three stories with hardly any interest, than I jumped around and picked a few more stories to read and again I could not find myself connecting with any of the stories. This is why I am saddened by this collection. I had high hopes for this anthology. I did not attempt to read any more of the stories in this anthology. In fact, I can not really remember the ones that I did read.