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Rating: Summary: A Mixed Bag Review: You don't really get the sense when reading "A Century of Mystery Stories 1980-1989" that these were the best short stories in the genre written during that particular decade. Rather, the book reads like these were the best stories the publishers could get the rights for. The husband and wife editing team of Bill Pronzini and Marcia Muller are first rate mystery writers themselves (and each contribute one story to this collection), and they have come up with a few dandys. Loren Estlemen's "Greektown," for example, is among his best Amos Walker shorts, while Pronzini's own "Stacked Deck" may his best ever short story. Lawrence Block is rightfully included, though he produced many stories in the 1980s better than "As Good as the Rest," which was included. Several of the stories truly don't rank with the best, and at least one, Clark Howard's "The Dakar Run," barely qualifies as a mystery story.At a mere 310 pages of text, the book is also far too short to cover an entire decade. Overall, this is a fairly undistinguished collection of shorts, despite the book's grandiose title.
Rating: Summary: A Mixed Bag Review: You don't really get the sense when reading "A Century of Mystery Stories 1980-1989" that these were the best short stories in the genre written during that particular decade. Rather, the book reads like these were the best stories the publishers could get the rights for. The husband and wife editing team of Bill Pronzini and Marcia Muller are first rate mystery writers themselves (and each contribute one story to this collection), and they have come up with a few dandys. Loren Estlemen's "Greektown," for example, is among his best Amos Walker shorts, while Pronzini's own "Stacked Deck" may his best ever short story. Lawrence Block is rightfully included, though he produced many stories in the 1980s better than "As Good as the Rest," which was included. Several of the stories truly don't rank with the best, and at least one, Clark Howard's "The Dakar Run," barely qualifies as a mystery story. At a mere 310 pages of text, the book is also far too short to cover an entire decade. Overall, this is a fairly undistinguished collection of shorts, despite the book's grandiose title.
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