Master's choice Book

I found this 1999 short story anthology to be surprisingly deep. I did not care for the Tony Hillerman or Judith Garner stories, but the other sixteen were interesting, thoughtful, and engaging.

The premise of the anthology is simple. Editor Lawrence Block asked nine bestselling authors to choose a favorite story that they wrote, paired with a story written by another author they admire.

"The Wedding Gig" by Stephen King-- A Prohibition-era jazz singer witnesses a gangland slaying outside Chicago. The author published this in 1980, back when he was known only as a horror writer, but he shows here he could also master historical crime fiction.

"Murder-Two" by Joyce Carol Oates -- An emotionally disturbed teenage boy is accused of killing his mother; he is defended by an attorney who attended school with the mother and harbors complicated feelings about them both. Like many of Oates' stories, the plot feels slow because she spends so much time describing the inner impressions (and obsessions) of each character. By the time you finish, you feel like you know them as well as if you had read an entire novel.

"The Crime of Miss Oyster Brown" by Peter Lovesey -- A funny British cozy about a spinster who commits a meaningless crime'reusing an un-cancelled postage stamp'which leads to dire unforeseen consequences.

"Too Many Crooks" by Donald Westlake-- Series character Dortmunder tunnels into a bank vault only to discover the bank is in the process of being robbed by another group of thieves, who promptly take him hostage. The charm of this deadpan comedy is how Dortmunder extracts himself and the money out from under the noses of a squad of police officers.

"Tired Old Man" by Harlan Ellison -- A West Coast writer meets an old man at a cocktail party who unnerves him more than he thought possible. Ellison based this strange, emotional story on a real-life conversation he had with Cornell Woolrich.

"The Problem of Cell 13" by Jacques Futrelle--Professor Augustus Van Dusen, known as the Thinking Machine, is locked in a maximum security prison for one week and must use his wits to find a way to escape. Written in 1905, this is the first and most well-known of Futrelle's series detective character. 

"En Famille" by Ed Gorman--This story relates three generations of addiction, death, and murder in under eight pages. Noir doesn't get any more hardboiled or tighter than this.

"The Blue Hotel" by Stephen Crane--In this classic American short story from 1898, five men are sequestered in a prairie town hotel during a snowstorm. When the only foreigner in the group, a Swede, accuses a young Nebraskan boy of cheating at cards it instigates a series of events that culminate in murder. This story examines America's frontier culture of male bravado, it's deep-rooted distrust of immigrants, and the notion that every murder is a collaboration of many individuals. 

"Another Room" by Joan Hess--A woman comes home from work to find a mysterious new bedroom in her one-room apartment. She is drinking constantly throughout this intriguing story, which allows it to be read as either a supernatural tale or a macabre drunken downward spiral into despair.  

"Trick or Treat" by Judith Garner--An English village is visited by a grim little girl on Oct 30, in a gruesome trial run for Halloween night. I might have enjoyed this nasty little story but I couldn't get over the repeated assertion that trick or treating is an American tradition. It was actually invented in Dublin, Ireland.

"High Stakes" by John Lutz--Ernie flees two loan sharks trying to kill him by stepping out his hotel window onto a six-inch ledge twelve stories above street level. This story rivals Jack Finney's more famous "Contents of a Dead Man's Pockets" for visceral man-on-a-ledge suspense. 

"August Heat" by W. F. Harvey--A painter sketches the face of a man who will be convicted of murder. Meanwhile, the man in the sketch is carving a gravestone with the painter's name on it. Neither knows the other, but their fates will be intertwined before the end of the day. This well-known story is more horror than crime. It is memorable, but I did not like the way it is left open-ended. The reader knows what must happen, but the details how are left to the imagination.

"Souls Burning" by Bill Pronzini--The series character Nameless Detective reunites with a former informant, fresh out of prison, one the eve of a city tragedy. This story is dark, concise, effective noir

"Murder of the Frankfurter Man" by Benjamin Appel--A family man looks back fondly on his juvenile delinquent days when he and his gang of middle school friends harassed and finally killed a poor Greek hot dog vendor.

"First Lead Gasser" by Tony Hillerman--An AP news writer tells the sad childhood story of a murderer executed in Sante Fe's gas chamber. Feels maudlin and dated.

"Goodbye, Pops" by Joe Gores-- A dying judge is visited on his deathbed by his two sons, one a successful bank president and the other an escaped convict. In only a few pages, the author draws a nuanced portrait of family dynamics.

"How Far It Could Go" by Lawrence Block -- A man and woman discuss over dinner how easy it might be to commit a murder. Decent but predictable.

"In a Grove" by John O'Hara -- Two former Hollywood rivals, Richard and Grady, meet by chance and decide to have a drink to catch up on old times. An odd, tragic game of one-upmanship ensues after Richard tries to embarrass his wife and Grady responds to her flirtations. Interesting characters, but it feels like the connective causal tissue of the story got edited out at some point in an attempt to make it more literary. It also feels like something Richard Albee or John Cheever might have written.