Authors: Rosemary Edghill
ISBN-13: 9780446679626, ISBN-10: 0446679623
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Hachette Book Group
Date Published: October 2004
Edition: (Non-applicable)
This anthology features 20 original stories of murder by acclaimed and award-winning science fiction and fantasy writers.
Although authors such as Randall Garrett in his acclaimed Lord Darcy series successfully melded whodunit plots with alternate universes where magic is real, few of the 20 supernatural mystery short stories in Edghill's all-original anthology rise above the mundane. Inspired contributions include Teresa Edgerton's "Captured in Silver," a nice ghostly locked-room murder tale, and Lillian Stewart Carl's "The Necromancer's Apprentice," which presents an interesting solution to the actual mystery surrounding the death of Amy Robsart, wife of Elizabeth I's favorite lord, balancing wizardry with astute deductions about the political motives of those who stood to benefit. The standout, James D. Macdonald's "A Tremble in the Air," introduces a psychic detective, Orville Nesbit, who's clearly heir to the tradition of such sleuths as Algernon Blackwood's John Silence and who deserves to live on in further tales. Unfortunately, most of the other stories rely on catchy gimmicks (e.g., a husband-and-wife sorcerer team based on Nick and Nora Charles in Sharon Lee and Steve Miller's "A Night at the Opera") rather than well-crafted puzzles. The jacket art showing a white-bearded wizard gazing at a body outline on the flagstones of a foggy, gas-lit street amusingly evokes the fantasy-crime blend. (Oct.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Introduction | 1 | |
Piece of mind | 5 | |
Special surprise guest appearance by ... | 21 | |
Doppelgangster | 35 | |
Mixed marriages can be murder | 51 | |
The case of the headless corpse | 63 | |
A death in the working | 83 | |
Cold case | 95 | |
Snake in the grass | 111 | |
Double jeopardy | 125 | |
Witch sight | 139 | |
Overrush | 155 | |
Captured in silver | 173 | |
A night at the opera | 189 | |
A tremble in the air | 205 | |
Murder entailed | 225 | |
Dropping hints | 245 | |
Au purr | 259 | |
Getting the chair | 277 | |
The necromancer's apprentice | 295 | |
Grey eminence | 311 | |
Afterwood | 341 |