The Oxford Book of Detective Stories [Paperback]

Patricia Craig (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 16, 2000 | ISBN-10: 0192880675 | ISBN-13: 978-0192880673 | Edition: First Edition

The field of detective fiction is vast, and "The Oxford Book of Detective Stories" brings together fiction from around the world to show how different nationalities have imposed their own stamp on the genre. As well as English and American stories from acknowledged masters such as Ellery Queen, Dashiell Hammett, and Agatha Christie, the anthology includes stories by Simenon, Conan Doyle, Sarah Paretsky and Ian Rankin and roams across Europe and further afield to embrace Japan, Denmark, Holland, Italy, Argentina, Czechoslovakia and other countries. Women detectives, police procedurals, the amateur sleuth, locked-room mysteries are all here, and in her introduction Patricia Craig examines the figure of the detective in international literature.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Reviewer, editor, and author Patricia Craig is currently working on an authorized biography of Brian Moore.

Product Details

• Paperback: 604 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; First Edition edition (May 16, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0192880675
• ISBN-13: 978-0192880673
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 2.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #403,679 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars THE USUAL SUSPECTS (AUTHORS) AND THEN SOME, May 6, 2004

By 

Loren D. Morrison "amateur_reviewer" (Los Angeles County, U.S.A.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Oxford Book of Detective Stories (Oxford Books of Prose) (Paperback)

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According to the editor, and born out by these stories, one of the things that distinguishes the English detective story from its American counterpart, is that it is almost always about "detecting" as in analyzing clues in the Sherlock Holmes manner and solving crimes mostly as a result of inductive reasoning, while American detective stories are often about the tough guy Raymond Chandler or Robert B. Parker type of detective, who gives and receives beatings and often strongarms confessions out of the frequently violent criminals.

Another thing I noticed in most of the stories from England was the fact that, where there was a murder, it usually took place "off stage" or had happened before the story opened. In the American version we frequently see the grisly doings as they happen.

I was familiar with some of these authors, Arthur Conan Doyle, Ruth Rendell, Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, and Dorothy Sayers to name a few. I was also introduced to a number of authors I had never read, even though their stories spanned a period from before my birth to fairly modern times.

To pick just one story to discuss, I settled on Ngaio Marsh's "Death on the Air" in which a "wireless" buff was electrocuted while tuning his very early model radio. This in a period where you had to manipulate two dials at the same time to bring in a signal. The electrocution was supposed to look accidental, but . . . .

Our detective and his police aids bring the case to its conclusion by detective work that seems very crude compared to our modern methods, which is coupled with some very insightful questioning of family members and friends of the deceased. Their methods prove every bit as effective as our modern ones which include DNA Testing, Computer analysis, etc. There was actually more pure intellect involved in many of the older stories that there is in many modern mysteries.

You might not like all the stories included in this book, but there are enough very good, very insightful tales to interest almost any mystery buff.