The Vicious Circle: Mystery and Crime Stories by Members of the Algonquin Round Table [Paperback]

Otto Penzler (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 6, 2009

The mystery and crime fiction of the Algonquin Round Table.

With the possible exception of the expatriate writers living in Paris in the 1920s, no single group of American literary figures has achieved as much fame or notoriety as the New York sophisticates who met to match wits and attempt to outshine each other as members of what came to be called the Algonquin Round Table.

The humorists Robert Benchley and S. J. Perelman, playwrights Marc Connelly and George S. Kaufman, novelists Edna Ferber and Alexander Woollcott, and most famously, Dorothy Parker, were the literary luminaries who made up this group, and each one produced a piece or two of crime fiction at some point, which are collected for the first time in this anthology by acclaimed mystery editor Otto Penzler.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

As mystery expert Penzler admits in his introduction, this volume contains "little classic detection... and less nail-biting suspense" than the usual crime fiction anthology, but those curious about the legendary figures of the Algonquin Round Table-a group of New York City writers and critics from the 1920s, many affiliated with the New Yorker-will get at least a taste of the wit and sophistication for which they were known. Of the dozen selections, the highlights are three parodic pieces by S.J. Perelman, notably the laugh-out-loud "Farewell, My Lovely Appetizer," a send-up of the hard-boiled genre that's a clear literary precursor to Woody Allen's Kaiser Lupowitz stories. Another stand-out is the wickedly absurd "The Mystery of the Poisoned Kipper" by Robert Benchley, perhaps best known today as the grandfather of the author of Jaws. While some tales disappoint, readers new to these authors may be inspired to sample more of their work.
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

The acerbic, alcohol-fueled critics, playwrights, and story writers who gathered at New York’s Algonquin Hotel in the 1920s to trade insults and gossip are legendary for their wit, eccentricity, and literary leaps. Rebounding after compiling the truly massive The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps (2007), Penzler, the mystery genre’s ardent champion, returns to his favorite form and presents another concentrated, cleverly themed anthology. Previous collections have gathered crime stories about sports and gambling; here humor is a common denominator, beginning with Penzler’s entertaining introduction. In “Farewell, My Lovely Appetizer,” the comic master S. J. Perelman spoofs the iconic figure of the hard-drinking, skirt-chasing private eye, coining hilarious pseudo–tough guy slang and choreographing elaborately pointless subterfuge. Marc Connelly cooks up a wee murder mystery involving two midgets that seems tailor-made for the old Alfred Hitchcock Presents television series. The crimes here are mainly against pretension and hope, and what masterful interpretations are found in classic tales by Ring Lardner, Edna Ferber, and Dorothy Parker in the collection’s finest work, the profoundly empathic “Big Blonde.” --Donna Seaman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Pegasus; Reprint edition (January 6, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1605980242
• ISBN-13: 978-1605980249
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #646,353 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Charming and thin, April 22, 2009

By 

James M. Rawley - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Vicious Circle: Mystery and Crime Stories by Members of the Algonquin Round Table (Paperback)

These stories may disappoint as mysteries, but they're all good and some of them are classic, like Lardner's "Haircut" and Dorothy Parker's "Big Blonde." The book's one drawback is its slimness: a mere twelve selections, some of them only five pages long -- and even at that, Perelman gets three selections and other authors get two. It's as if mysteries by Algonquin round table members were pretty thin on the ground. Good quotes, good introductions -- an excellent anthology that is over much too soon.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best book I've read in a while, October 31, 2008

By 

Lin Richard (West Lafayette,Oh.) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Vicious Circle: Mystery and Crime Stories by Members of the Algonquin Round Table (Hardcover)

I wasn't really sure what I would get when I ordered this book,but the many different authors included cinched it as a good buy.Yes,you should read this book,it is filled with so many clever and acid blurbs from a bygone era,yet upon reading you become immursed in it and the book really is timeless.