The Vintage Book of Classic Crime (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard)

Rating:
Summary: A Worthless Collection
Review: I purchased the "Vintage Book of Classic Crime" expecting it to be primarily a collection of crime and mystery short stories by classic authors. Instead it is primarily novel excerpts that are not in and of themselves self-contained stories. What exactly is the point when you can buy "The Postman Always Rings Twice" or "The Lady in the Lake?" What do you need a four page excerpt for? This collection is virtually worthless.

Rating:
Summary: A Worthless Collection
Review: I purchased the "Vintage Book of Classic Crime" expecting it to be primarily a collection of crime and mystery short stories by classic authors. Instead it is primarily novel excerpts that are not in and of themselves self-contained stories. What exactly is the point when you can buy "The Postman Always Rings Twice" or "The Lady in the Lake?" What do you need a four page excerpt for? This collection is virtually worthless.

Rating:
Summary: Collected stories for the serious mystery student.
Review: Michael Dibdin's "Book of Classic Crime" tackles more than a century of work in this field. It features many of the usual writing suspects, from Americans Raymond Chandler, Edgar Allan Poe, and Dashiell Hammett; to Swedes Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo; Frenchman Georges Simenon; Brits Julian Symons and G.F. Newman; and Japanese mystery-maker Masako Togawa. However, Dibdin has also wrangled into these pages some distinguished authors not generally thought of as purveyors of creative carnage. C.S. Forester, for instance, is represented by the tale of a common man discovering his uncommon homicidal talents. Emile Zola sketches an unexpectedly terrifying boat ride on the Seine River. And Hunter Thompson shows his macabre humor about human sacrifices in an excerpt from "Fearing and Loathing in Las Vegas." Unfortunately, none of the pieces in this book extends beyond 14 pages. Most of them reach barely half that length. Such limits work fine in a section that Dibdin devotes to critical wisdom about the past and promise of crime fiction, the snippets drawn from essays and stories by such notables as Bertolt Brecht, S.J. Perelman, and Northrop Frye (who contends that "In the melodrama of the brutal thriller we come as close as it is normally possible for art to come to the pure self-righteousness of the lynching mob"). Much less satisfying, though, are what Dibdin calls the "bleeding chunks" he's cut from full novels and printed here. How many readers, coming to this anthology expecting to receive a full helping of Ira Levin or Barbara Vine or James M. Cain will be infuriated to discover that all they really get is a tease, a Whitman's Sampler of literary accomplishments. If you want context for the obscenely suggestive episode from James McClure's South African cop drama "The Steam Pig," or you're dying to find out what happens to the kindly landlords in Marie Belloc Lowndes' "The Lodger"...well, you'll just have to locate the books yourself or be satisfied not knowing whodunit, why they did it, or

Rating:
Summary: The Best of the Best
Review: What a treat this book is! If you're a fan of the noir style of crime fiction then this is for you. First, most stories in this book are only excerpts which leave you hanging but in a good way. These tasty excerpts are from books which compell you to go out and read the entire book. That's just what I did when I read "Squeeze Play". The book contains poems and some complete short stories which are right on the mark! A diverse collection very thorough compilation of the genre.

Rating:
Summary: The Best of the Best
Review: What a treat this book is! If you're a fan of the noir style of crime fiction then this is for you. First, most stories in this book are only excerpts which leave you hanging but in a good way. These tasty excerpts are from books which compell you to go out and read the entire book. That's just what I did when I read "Squeeze Play". The book contains poems and some complete short stories which are right on the mark! A diverse collection very thorough compilation of the genre.