The Best of Mystery: 63 Short Stories Chosen by the Master of Suspense [Hardcover]

Alfred Hitchcock (Compiler)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2004

These 63 spine-tingling stories originally appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery magazine, and in the words of the master himself, they’ll “make your blood run cold.” Hitchcock coolly serves up cool cops, clever gangsters, bodies stuffed in trunks, kidnappings, adulterous affairs, murder, and espionage, and the resulting thrills are positively delicious. The writers include Ed McBain, whose “Sadie When She Died” features a strange cat-and-mouse game between a sharp detective and the husband of a murdered woman whom the police suspect of having committed the crime. Other tales come from Donald E. Westlake, Bill Pronzini, Patricia Highsmith, Henry Slezar, and Richard M. Ellis.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 640 pages
• Publisher: Galahad; First edition (March 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0883656442
• ISBN-13: 978-0883656440
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.6 x 2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #468,451 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #11 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Mystery & Thrillers > Mystery > Anthologies

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars You Could Kill Someone With This Thing, December 28, 2008

By 

R. H. Rich "Just One Reader" (Yorktown, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This is a frighteningly large hardcover. Co-workers asked me if I was reading a textbook. No, instead it's 63 short stories culled from years of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. There's some big names in here, including Ed McBain, Lawrence Block, and Hillary Waugh.

Still, it's an uneven lot, with some true clunkers. Other stories are horribly dated by modern sensibilities with references to prices that stagger the imagination more than the dirty deeds (Sixty cents for a cheeseburger? Only at White Castle...) and a few references to 'Nam and the Cold War. There's even a tale with a science fiction bent about the first manned mission to Mars, but the author has planted tongue firmly in cheek, making it one of the more enjoyable, if quirky, stories in the collection.

There's enough memorable material to make this worth the read. I'd even recommend spacing the stories out, reading a few between other, longer works to prevent burnout. Recommended to any fans of mystery in any genre. You're sure to find something of merit here, especially if you find this on the cheap in a used bookstore since I'm fairly certain it's long out of print.

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars lots of great little short stories, June 1, 2005

By 

forest - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Best of Mystery: 63 Short Stories Chosen by the Master of Suspense (Hardcover)

most of the stories are about 5-10 pages. interesting easy to read stories chosen from the Alfred Hitchcock mystery magazine. The book was put together after Hitchcock's death and stories of course were not written by hitch.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars One of The worst Anthologies ever compiled!, November 27, 2011

By 

JustAReader "NoNeed2Comment" (Major Earthquake Faultline) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Best of Mystery: 63 Short Stories Chosen by the Master of Suspense (Hardcover)

this one is simply the worst so-called Anthology i've ever read. it tried so hard to fool you with such cheating words: "beware--the anthology is not recommended for late night reading. these masterful tales are guaranteed to unnerve."

give me a break! there were actually handful barely readable ones in it, and most of them were garbage-like bad stories in mediocre writing. indeed we have to beware, the anthology is indeed not recommended for late night reading, because if you did, you'd become so upset that one after another, page after page was just so bad and you'd lose your peaceful mind and unnerve your temper since this was just a collection of mediocre garbage.

there were only a few readable:

WINTER RUN

YOU CAN'T BLAME ME

THE COST OF KENT CASTWELL

PSEUDO INDETITY

THAT RUSSSIAN!

BLIND DATE

PRESSURE

THE RUNNING MAN

THE VIETNAM CIRCLE

SADIE WHEN SHE DIED

A VERY CAUTIOUS BOY

A TRY FOR THE BIG PRIZE

NIGHT OF THE TWISTERS

WARRIOR'S FAREWELL

WITH A SMILE FOR THE ENDING

TELEVISION COUNTRY

ART FOR MONEY

NOTHING BUT HUMAN NATURE

MURDER, 1990

that's all. others were just pure junk. but even those i listed above were not in the least thrilling, just barely readable.