Customer Reviews

Powers of Detection: Stories of Mystery & Fantasy

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Powers of Detection collects 12 short stories that are an innovative blend of fantasy and mystery. Using a fantasy backgrounds for who-done-its not only makes for a fun read, it is also quite practical as this anthology should appeal to both mystery fans and fantasy fans. My mother is the former, I am the later and we both liked this book.

Many brilliant authors lend delicious stories to this work. My favorite, without question, was the Simon R Green story "The Nightside, Needless to Say". Of course, I'm prejudiced, I love Green's Nightside series. With this story he leaves Taylor behind, and instead introduces a new (and just as dysfunctional) PI. Though only slightly familiar by Anne Bishop's previous work, I found her story "The Price" to be intriguing and quite well done. "The Death of ClickClickWhistle" by Mike Doogan was so well written and funny that I am seeking out other works of his just because of this tale.

Only one of the stories failed to truly captivate me, and that was "The Boy Who Chased Seagulls" by Michael Armstrong. It also isn't really a mystery, so I'm not sure how/why it was included in this anthology. It is much more a modern fable and a mystery story.

The other eight stories are "Cold Spell" by Donna Andrews, "Lovely" by John Straley, "Fairy Dust" by Charlaine Harris, "The Judgment" by Anne Perry, "The Sorcerer's Assassin" by Sharon Shinn, "Palimpsest" by Laura Anne Gilman, "Cairene Dawn" by Jay Caselberg, and "Justice is a Two-edged Sword" by Dana Stabenow.

Though one of the stories is less than excellent, the rest of the volume is spectacular. Though small at only twelve stories, this anthology is still well worth the price because the quality is superb. If you like anthologies or mystery or fantasy, then treat yourself to this wonderful work.

Highly Recommended.

These tales range from series continuations, like Simon R Green's Nightside and Charlaine Harris's Southern Vampire series to what seem to be standalone stories - I am not sure, but if they are continuations of series, they are done quite well. I don't believe that you need to have read any of the above mentioned series to understand these stories.

There is only one Sci Fi story in the bunch - all the rest are fantasy mysteries. Lots of murder, lots of dun-da-dun-dun logic, solving the mysteries. In fact, though I'm not a serious fan of the mystery genre, I found most of the stories in this book to be quite enjoyable.

Overall, since it's easy to put down - there are 12 separate stories under 220 or so pages - I recommend this book for those who love to read fantasy but don't have time for the epics these days.

(*)>

I loved this short-story collection full of writers that mix mystery with fantasy. The twelve stories in Powers of Detection are fresh, imaginative and original. You will read about vampires, werewolves, fairies and other supernatural creatures with just the right touch of suspense without overloading the stories with too much plotline. My favorites are Anne Bishop's "The Price," Donna Andrews's "Cold Spell," John Staley's "Lovely" (the goriest in the book), Michael Armstrong's "The Boy Who Chased Seagulls," and my favorite one, Charlaine Harris's "Fairy Dust," which is taken from the Sookie Stackhouse series.

There are stories that focus on the fantasy/paranormal aspects while others lean more toward mystery. There are also those that come across as too Harry Potter-like for my taste while others have a lot of gore. But my favorite of all, as said earlier, is Charlaine Harris's effort. I love the Sookie Stackhouse series and Harris didn't let me down with her contribution to this book. All in all, this is a great short-story collection. Perfect for Halloween! If you like mysteries with fantasy as the subgenre (or vice versa), then don't hesitate to pick up Powers of Detection.

Editor Dana Stabenow admits in the introduction to this volume that she doesn't read much fantasy. We can tell. What's astounding is that an acclaimed mystery writer would present us with a collection of mystery stories so devoid of suspense and drama.

Also in the introduction, Stabenow admits her own story in this collection is her first stab at writing fantasy. May I offer this advice, Dana, writer to writer: your Mama may be proud of you for trying something new, but your audience reads fantasy and mystery every day, and we expect a little more than your virgin effort. Your story isn't bad, but it also isn't new. Your characters and setting are stock, and your mystery was so predictable that I knew who was guilty as soon as he was called by name.

Still, Stabenow's story is a masterpiece of style and pacing compared to most in this haphazard collection. Most of the authors were selected because of their acclaimed novel writing, and they don't seem to have grasped that they are writing short stories. Most of these stories feel like outlines or treatments for much longer stories.

Witness this line from Anne Bishop's story "The Price": "We'd been hunting for two days--and two more men had died." No further mention of those two days or those two deaths. Is it really likely that nothing of interest happened in those two days? Or is it more likely that the author was trying to compress a story concept suitable for a 250-page novel into less than ten thousand words?

The stories in this collection range from the strained (Simon R. Green's "The Nightside, Needless To Say") to the predictable (Jay Caselberg's "Cairene Dawn") to the absurd (Sharon Shinn's "The Sorcerer's Assassin") to the out-and-out bad (Mike Doogan's "The Death of Clickclickwhistle"). Three tales, the piece by Green, Charlaine Harris' "Fairy Dust," and Laura Anne Gilman's "Palimpsest," appear to have been written largely as ads for the ongoing novel series from which they are drawn. And what's particularly galling about all this is the number of highly acclaimed and bestselling authors who appear to have pulled some old leftover out of the bottom of a dusty desk drawer to get their names between these covers.

The one true success in this collection is Michael Armstrong's brief "The Boy Who Chased Seagulls." It is timed and paced appropriately for the length of the work and is an unqualified pleasure to read. There's no murder mystery in the tale, and it isn't even really a fantasy. It might be better to call it a Tall Tale. It is for this story that this collection merits two stars instead of one. Yet, mashed in with all this pelf, it doesn't fit in, and only serves to point up how weak the other stories are.

I would say that the two pieces that most get my goat are Donna Andrews' "Cold Spell" and Anne Perry's "The Judgement." Both of these stories lack the strength of character to stand out, and both of them lack the courage to truly suck. They just sit there, taking up space. It's as though the authors received final warnings from the gas company and needed to tear something off to cover the bill--and then no less a publisher than Penguin expected me to read this twaddle. When I spend my own money on a book, I have higher expectations than that.

Fantasy readers will find the settings and characters of these stories tepid and recycled. Mystery readers will find these stories tired, badly paced, and predictable. This book is not recommended for anyone.

When Dana Stabenow's first attempt at sword and sorcery came out too long for a murder-in-a-fantasy-setting anthology being put together by another editor, she decided to put together an anthology of her own. She asked for tales of murder in either a fantasy or science fiction setting, and a host of talented authors, including such well-known names as Simon R. Green, Charlaine Harris, Anne Perry, and Anne Bishop responded. While only one author, Mike Doogan, took the science fiction approach, the twelve stories assembled here in Powers of Detection: Stories of Mystery & Fantasy cover a wide range of settings and situations, some of them more magical than others. There is not a bad story in the lot, although a few are rather predictable and borderline pedantic.

Donna Andrews gets the ball rolling quite well with "Cold Spell," an entertaining murder mystery (in which the victim dies of a knife wound without having been stabbed) puzzled out by a master wizard with a bad cold and his surprisingly capable apprentice. Simon R. Green takes us to "The Nightside, Needless to Say," where a detective wakes up dead and works to solve his own murder. It's fluff, but it's fun fluff purely in the vein of Green's Nightside milieu. In John Straley's "Lovely," the detecting is done by a raven - he doesn't care who did what to whom and why; he just wants to be there when the bad guy murders another potentially juicy meal. Anne Bishop, author of the fantastic Black Jewels Trilogy, provides the bloodiest case of murder and mayhem, as befitting the sort of activities often found in the world of the Blood, where "The Price" must always be paid in the end. A powerful witch seems to have it out for the male population, and her dark work is impressive enough to momentarily disrupt the honeymoon of Daemon Sadi and Jaenelle. In "Fairy Dust," Charlaine Harris shows you one way to kill a fairy - and also why you should think twice about it if your intended victim has siblings.

Anne Perry's "The Judgement," which chronicles a trial for witchcraft, proved a little disappointing to me, largely because the author kept going out of her way to tell me how the sanctimonious lawyer and judge felt about what they were doing - and the twist at the end didn't really work for me. Sharon Shinn's "The Sorcerer's Assassin" is a rather light-hearted take on the subject of murder among the instructors at a school for mages. Michael Armstrong's "The Boy Who Chased Seagulls," which draws upon an old Aleut legend regarding seagulls (and why you shouldn't make them mad), may be the best story in this collection, even though it doesn't truly fit the overall theme. Fans of Laura Anne Gilman's Retrievers novels will probably enjoy her contribution, "Palimpsest," more than I did, as I get the impression the characters are more significant than this particular story. Mike Doogan's "The Death of Clickclickwhistle" gives us a murder mystery onboard a starship carrying a strange assortment of interstellar diplomats, while Jay Caselberg's well-written "The Cairene Dawn" is so blatantly obvious (to everyone but the protagonist) a modern retelling of an ancient Egyptian legend that I was turned off from the start. The collection ends with the editor's own story, "Justice is a Two-Edged Sword," a sword-and-sorcery tale in which justice is indeed meted out by the power of the staff of Truth and the sword of Justice.

Overall, I think Powers of Detection will prove more interesting to fantasy fans than anyone else. Some of the mysteries explored in these pages are far too predictable to impress the seasoned mystery reader, and the cast of characters are on occasion more inventive than the situations being explored. It's by no means a bad collection, though, as I can't say I truly disliked a single one of the stories - and any book featuring contributions from the likes of Anne Bishop and Simon R. Green is worthy of attention.

I picked up this book because I am a huge fan of Sharon Shinn. I was delighted to discover that her story, while wonderful fun, was not even my favorite. The short stories have inspired me to check out other works by the contributors-mystery and fantasy. It's a great read for fans of mystery, fantasy or short stories in general.

I bought this book for the short story by Charlaine Harris. While I enjoyed her Sookie story, I was less than thrilled with the remaining stories. They fell much closer to the mystery genre than fantasy, and in many instances this was the author's first foray into the world of fantasy, and it just didn't work.

Powers of Detection collects 12 short stories that are an innovative blend of fantasy and mystery. Using a fantasy backgrounds for who-done-its not only makes for a fun read, it is also quite practical as this anthology should appeal to both mystery fans and fantasy fans. My mother is the former, I am the later and we both liked this book.

Many brilliant authors lend delicious stories to this work. My favorite, without question, was the Simon R Green story "The Nightside, Needless to Say". Of course, I'm prejudiced, I love Green's Nightside series. With this story he leaves Taylor behind, and instead introduces a new (and just as dysfunctional) PI. Though only slightly familiar by Anne Bishop's previous work, I found her story "The Price" to be intriguing and quite well done. "The Death of ClickClickWhistle" by Mike Doogan was so well written and funny that I am seeking out other works of his just because of this tale.

Only one of the stories failed to truly captivate me, and that was "The Boy Who Chased Seagulls" by Michael Armstrong. It also isn't really a mystery, so I'm not sure how/why it was included in this anthology. It is much more a modern fable and a mystery story.

The other eight stories are "Cold Spell" by Donna Andrews, "Lovely" by John Straley, "Fairy Dust" by Charlaine Harris, "The Judgment" by Anne Perry, "The Sorcerer's Assassin" by Sharon Shinn, "Palimpsest" by Laura Anne Gilman, "Cairene Dawn" by Jay Caselberg, and "Justice is a Two-edged Sword" by Dana Stabenow.

Though one of the stories is less than excellent, the rest of the volume is spectacular. Though small at only twelve stories, this anthology is still well worth the price because the quality is superb. If you like anthologies or mystery or fantasy, then treat yourself to this wonderful work.

Highly Recommended.

I bought this book with one particular author in mind, Anne Bishop. However I found several other stories in the anthology to be very interesting. It was especially nice because I had never read anything from any of the other authors and yet now, I became interested in what other works they may have. I haven't even finished all of the stories, so there may be other winners in there. Since that is the danger of an anthology, like a albumn where you buy it for one song, in this case a story, I was pleased to find that I had not wasted my money.

As with most anthologies, it's a grab bag. Some of the stories were good mysteries. Only a couple of them were the kind of short stories that are one small step up from poetry in the navel-gazing, see-how-clever-I-am category that makes me hesitant about the whole idea of short stories. I bought this one for the Anne Bishop story, which was worth it. The others--the good ones, that is--were just frosting.