The Big Book of Adventure Stories (Vintage Original) [Paperback]

Otto Penzler (Editor)

Book Description

Release date: May 31, 2011 | Series: Vintage Original

A hair-raising collection of adventure stories that's so big and enthralling if you open it you may never be seen again: enter at your own risk.

 

Everyone loves adventure, and Otto Penzler has collected the best adventure stories of all time into one mammoth volume. With stories by Jack London, O. Henry, H. Rider Haggard, Alastair MacLean, Talbot Mundy, Cornell Woolrich, and many others, this wide-reaching and fascinating volume contains some of the best characters from the most thrilling adventure tales, including The Cisco Kid; Sheena, Queen of the Jungle; Bulldog Drummond; Tarzan; The Scarlet Pimpernel; Conan the Barbarian; Hopalong Cassidy; King Kong; Zorro; and The Spider. Divided into sections that embody the greatest themes of the genre—Sword & Sorcery, Megalomania Rules, Man vs. Nature, Island Paradise, Sand and Sun, Something Feels Funny, Go West Young Man, Future Shock, I Spy, Yellow Peril, In Darkest Africa—it is destined to be the greatest collection of adventure stories ever compiled.

 

Featuring:

Lawless open seas

Ferocious army ants

Deadeyed gunmen

Exotic desert islands

Feverish jungle adventures

 

Including:

The story that introduced The Cisco Kid

The complete novel of Tarzan the Terrible

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Otto Penzler lives in New York City.

Product Details

• Paperback: 896 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (May 31, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 030747450X
• ISBN-13: 978-0307474506
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 1.6 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #101,675 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Otto Penzler (born July 8, 1942) is an editor of mystery fiction in the United States, and proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City, where he lives.[1]
Contents

1 Biography
2 Works
2.1 Publisher
2.2 Series Editor
2.3 Editor (Recent Books)
2.4 Guest appearances
2.5 Awards
3 References
4 External links

Biography

Penzler, who graduated from the University of Michigan, is the co-author the "Encyclopedia of Mystery and Detection: for which he won an Edgar Allan Poe Award in 1977. He also wrote 101 Greatest Movies of Mystery and Suspense (2000). For the New York Sun, he wrote The Crime Scene, a popular weekly mystery fiction column that ran for five years. He has worked with authors including Elmore Leonard, Nelson DeMille, Joyce Carol Oates, Sue Grafton, Mary Higgins Clark, Robert Crais, Michael Connelly, James Lee Burke and Thomas H. Cook.

He founded The Mysterious Press, a publishing house devoted entirely to mystery and crime fiction, in 1975. Among the authors it published (works published in America for the first time, not reprints) are Eric Ambler, Kingsley Amis, Isaac Asimov, Robert Bloch, James M. Cain, Raymond Chandler, Jerome Charyn, Len Deighton, James Ellroy, Patricia Highsmith, P.D. James, H.R.F. Keating, Peter Lovesey, Ed McBain, Ross Macdonald, Marcia Muller, Ellis Peters, Ruth Rendell, Mickey Spillane, Ross Thomas, Donald E. Westlake and Cornell Woolrich. In the 1980s it was publishing more than 100 books a year and the imprint was affiliated with major publishers in England (Century-Hutchinson-Arrow), Japan (Hayakwa Publishing), Italy (Mondadori) and Sweden (Bra Bocker). The Mysterious Book Club became a division of the Book of the Month Club and Mysterious Audios an imprint with Dove Audio.

After selling The Mysterious Press to Warner Books in 1989, he created an Otto Penzler Books imprint for Macmillan (later Scribner). He moved the imprint to Carroll & Graf, then to Harcourt (later Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). He also established the Otto Penzler Books imprint in London, first with Quercus, now with Atlantic/Corvus. He reacquired The Mysterious Press name from Hachette in 2009; it is now an imprint at Grove Atlantic.

Penzler founded The Mysterious Bookshop in mid-town Manhattan and after twenty-seven years moved to Tribeca. It is now the oldest and largest mystery specialist bookstores in the world.

In 2002, he hosted a television series of great mystery films for the Turner Classic Movies channel.

He has edited more than fifty anthologies of crime fiction of both reprints and newly commissioned stories, including the prestigious Best American Mystery Stories since 1997.

Penzler served on the Board of Directors of the Mystery Writers of America for fourteen years and was awarded the organization's Ellery Queen Award and a Raven (its highest non-writing award. He won a second Edgar for editing "The Lineup," a collection of profiles of famous detectives, written by their creators.

On April 8, 2010 Swann Galleries auctioned The Otto Penzler Collection of British Espionage and Thriller Fiction. The sale represented a select portion of Penzler's private library with works by Eric Ambler, Ian Fleming, Graham Greene, John Le Carre, William Le Queux, H. C. McNeile, E. Phillips Oppenheim, and Dennis Wheatley. Penzler also befriended many noted authors including Ambler, Ken Follett, John Gardner and others, who inscribed copies of their works. "British spy novels are among the greatest of all works in the mystery genre," Penzler said in the introduction to the Swann auction catalogue. "This is the first auction ever devoted entirely to this important literary genre."

Penzler lives in New York City and in Connecticut with his wife, Lisa Atkinson.
Works
Publisher

Otto Penzler Books. An imprint at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (2005-2010).
The Armchair Detective Library. Reprinted classic crime fiction for collectors and libraries.
The Mysterious Press. Established in 1975. Sold to Time/Warner in 1989; reacquired by Penzler in 2009 and now an imprint at Grove/Atlantic.
The Armchair Detective. A quarterly journal for studies of mystery and suspense fiction (17 years).

Series Editor

The Best American Mystery Stories. Annual series since 1997, with guest editors. Writer Robert B. Parker wrote "Otto Penzler knows more about crime fiction than most people know about anything, and proves it once more in this brilliant anthology."
The Best American Crime Writing. Annual series since 2002, with Thomas H. Cook and guest editors.

Editor (Recent Books)

"The Big Book of Ghost Stories" (2012)
The Big Book of Adventure Stories (2011)
"Christmas at the Mysterious Bookshop" (2010)
"The Greatest Russian Stories of Crime and Suspense" (2010)
"The Best American Noir of the Century" (2010)
"The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories: (2010)
"Agents of Treachery" (2010)
The Lineup: The World's Greatest Crime Writers Tell the Inside Story of Their Greatest Detectives (2009)
The Vampire Archive (2009)
Black Noir: Mystery, Crime, and Suspense Stories by African-American Writers (2009)
The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps (2007)
Dead Man's Hand: Crime Fiction at the Poker Table (2007)
The Vicious Circle: Mystery and Crime Stories by Members of the Algonquin Round Table (2007)
Murder in the Rough (2006)
Murder at the Racetrack (2006)
Murder at the Foul Line (2006)
Murder is My Racquet (2005)
Dangerous Women (2005)
Murderer's Row (2001)
Murder On the Ropes (2001)
Best American Mystery Stories of the Century. Edited with Tony Hillerman. (2000)
Murder and Obsession (1999)
The 50 Greatest Mysteries of All Time (1998)
Murder For Revenge (1998)
Murder For Love (1996)
The Crown Crime Companion : The Top 100 Mystery Novels of All Time. Edited with Mickey Friedman. (1995)

Guest appearances

Author Lawrence Block wrote a Christmas story, "The Burglar Who Smelled Smoke", set in The Mysterious Bookshop, where Otto Penzler appeared in character.[2]

Author Elmore Leonard's novel, Up In Honey's Room, features an escaped World War II German soldier, a Waffen SS major named Otto Penzler.[3][4]

Awards

2010. Edgar Award from Mystery Writers of America. For The Lineup. Best Biographical/Critical Work
2003. Raven Award from Mystery Writers of America. As owner of Mysterious Bookshop.
1994. Ellery Queen Award from Mystery Writers of America. Contributions to mystery publishing.
1977. Edgar Award from Mystery Writers of America. For The Encyclopedia of Mystery and Detection. Best Critical/Biographical Work.


External links

Mysterious Bookshop
Otto Penzler

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 34 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars HOURS OF ADVENTURE June 21, 2011

By City Rain

Format:Paperback

This is, without doubt, the finest collection of adventure stories ever published. All the stars are here, from Jack London to Cornell Woolrich, a full range of the best adventure stories money - and not all that much of it considering the breadth and quality of these stories - can buy. It was such a pleasure to be with such heroes of Bulldog Drummond and the the Cisco Kid again, a lovely stroll down memory lane that brought back that first youthful sense of peril. Here is high adventure as it once was written by the greatest of its practitioners. Frankly, nostalgia was never more fun. Thank you, Mr. Penzler, for this gift.

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing worlds of high adventure July 18, 2011

By NSoriano

Format:Paperback

Adventure stories? I thought. Well, I'll give it a try, but I was wary.

These are the kind of stories you always knew were out there, but you just never read. If you don't live in a tree you've heard of Tarzan, Conan, King Kong, or the Cisco Kid. But except for Hollywood's interpretations of these characters, most readers today are unfamiliar with their origins in prose.

To me, Tarzan was somebody a bunch of swimmers and body builders played in a string of cheap movies (Or in the case of Graystoke, the Legend of Tarzan, not so cheap). So who knew Tarzan was as clever as James Bond and as savage as Conan the Barbarian? And who knew I would enjoy this new anthology by Otto Penzler even more than The Big Book of Pulp Stories?

Some of these classic tales are amazing, others are interesting but lacking a certain zing (sorry Talbot Mundy). But because of the stories I read in this book, I've already placed orders for more stories by Robert E Howard. I'm on the lookout for more Philip Jose Farmer. I finished Mr. Farmer's "After King Kong Fell" and decided I can never watch the Fay Wray King Kong movie the same way again.

Anyway, this book is highly recommended. You might not enjoy everything but the book is so BIG you'll find something to love!

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Thank you Otto Penzler! August 10, 2011

By Lewis McLean

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

At the age of 78 years, I am entering my second childhood...and the Big Book of Adventure Stories is the greatest gift I could have received. Stories by authors I enjoyed in my pre-teens and early teens: E.R.Burroughs, Saki, P.C.Wren...and a host of authors I missed as an avid young reader! This book is a treasure! I only hope that Mr. Penzler is considering compiling Volume 2 in the near future....second childhoods don't last forever.