The Best American Mystery Stories 2005 (The Best American Series) [Paperback]

Joyce Carol Oates (Editor), Otto Penzler (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 5, 2005

The Best American series has been the premier annual showcase for the country's finest short fiction and nonfiction since 1915. Each volume's series editor selects notable works from hundreds of periodicals. A special guest editor, a leading writer in the field, then chooses the very best twenty or so pieces to publish. This unique system has made the Best American series the most respected--and most popular--of its kind.

The Best American Mystery Stories 2005 includes

Scott Turow • Edward P. Jones • Louise Erdrich • Dennis Lehane • Daniel Handler • Laura Lippman • George V. Higgins • David Means • Richard Burgin • Scott Wolven • Stuart M. Kaminsky • and others

Joyce Carol Oates, guest editor, is a highly respected novelist, critic, playwright, poet, and short story writer. She is the author of numerous books, including the National Book Award winner Them and most recently the novel The Falls.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Says series editor Otto Penzler, "It's about finding the best stories, by whoever happens to have written them," in his foreword to this outstanding mystery annual. He chose Joyce Carol Oates as this year's guest editor, and Oates almost immediately put her brand on the book—not waiting for Penzler to send her the top 50 choices from which she would winnow the 20 final entries, but branching out on her own, finding some of the volume's best stories by beginning writers in small circulation magazines as well as in collections from relatively unknown publishers. There's also much star power, made even more impressive by the editors' resistance to famous names getting in on reputation alone. Dennis Lehane's "Until Gwen," Laura Lippman's "The Shoeshine Man's Regrets," Louise Erdrich's "Disaster Stamps of Pluto" and Scott Turow's "Loyalty" are as good as any full-length novels these writers have produced recently. And what a great pleasure it is to have the remarkable talents of the late George V. Higgins displayed in all their glory in "Jack Duggan's Law."
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Wags might expect this annual anthology, under Oates' guest-editorship, to grow to 1,000 pages--or at least to begin publishing quarterly. Never fear. Collaborating with series general editor Penzler, she has selected a tight 20 stories. In his foreword, Penzler praises the genre-blurring evolution of "mystery" stories and provides proof of his premise in the following pages. The roster includes well-known surnames--Erdrich, Higgins, Kaminsky, Lehane, Sayles, and Turow--but the lesser-knowns (culled more often from literary journals and even e-zines) deliver delightful surprises: in "The Identity Club," Richard Burgin draws a high-concept karmic circle; in "The Last Man I Killed," David Rachel maps a connection between war and academe; in "Reconstruction," Sam Shaw sends two misfits on the lam; and in "Barracuda," Scott Wolven puts a crooked timber appraiser through a series of left turns. Readers irked by the lack of pure detection can console themselves with "Delmonico," a locked-room noir, by Daniel Handler (aka Lemony Snicket). For any fan of good storytelling. Keir Graff
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books (October 5, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0618517456
• ISBN-13: 978-0618517459
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,012,453 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great for lovers of dark literary fiction., November 26, 2005

By 

Ramona Wilder "Ray" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Best American Mystery Stories 2005 (The Best American Series) (Paperback)

This book is not for sissies! It's a collection of fantastic, dark & edgy crime stories of fine quality for those who love this type of thing. Who better than Joyce Carol Oates and Otto Penzler to deliver the most unique and provocative yarns for your consumption. If you're a fan of real writing that pushes the edge, then you should read this book. Highly recommended.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Intricate mysteries, March 31, 2006

By 

trippin toadie (Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Best American Mystery Stories 2005 (The Best American Series) (Paperback)

If you see the title of this book and think there are twenty "whodunit" mysteries and that's what you're looking for then keep on looking. If you enjoy the mysterious nature of life and how we deal with each other and make the decisions we do then by all means please try this deeply satisfying book.

Favorite stories of mine are When All This Was Bay Bridge by Tim McLoughlin, Delmonico by Daniel Handler and The Last Man I Killed by David Rachel. There are also wonderful stories by Dennis Lehane, Scott Turow, Pulitzer Prize winning author Edward P. Jones and writer/director John Sayles. While the book is not full of "mysteries" many stories do have plot twists and surprises that will keep you turning the pages. They all deal with crimes in different ways and how they can effect us. Some crimes happen to the narrator; in some the narrator commits the crime. Not all is what it seems in these stories.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good collection of dark mysteries, February 6, 2006

By 

Mr. Robert Mccaffrey "Mc Cabins Reader" (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Best American Mystery Stories 2005 (The Best American Series) (Paperback)

This collection edited by Joyce Carol Oates is a very good collection of dark mysteries in the tradition of Dennis Lehane, George Pelecanos, Michael Connelly, and Elmore Leonard(more in line with 'Killshot' and his older works). If you are looking for more traditional mystery stories in the tradition of Agatha Christie then these stories may not be for you.