Given its extraordinary span, its international scope, and its variant styles and groundbreaking stylists, A Century of Great Suspense Stories is a singular achievement. A bestselling master of suspense himself Jeffery Deaver had the enviable task of selecting from the thousands of stories written over the past one hundred years those which best represented the classic form, as well as the justly celebrated authors whose ironic twists and stunning payoffs left a lasting, vivid, and unnerving impression. The result is a triumph. In this ambitious anthology you’ll revel in the sardonic, overtly amoral plotting of Patricia Highsmith. You’ll rediscover the strangely poignant and surprising turns of Stanley Ellin, and the profoundly underrated Margaret Millar, a genius who mixed savage social satire with brooding horror. You’ll be treated to Stephen King at his chilling best. You’ll find yourself on the violent urban streets of Ross Macdonald and Mickey Spillane, and seeped in the ominous regional flavor of Sharyn McCrumb and Tony Hillerman. You’ll marvel at the cunning webs spun by Lawrence Block, Ruth Rendell, Anthony Boucher, and Sara Paretsky, all of whom defy expectations as they reinvent the genre. And you’ll understand the awesome reputations of those authors who set the standard, such as the legendary Harlan Ellison, Fredric Brown, the master of the twist ending, and James M. Cain, uncannily skilled at knowing what went on between men and women behind closed doors. (The darker the room the better.) Delivering everything from the one-two punch of the detective story to the ingeniously precise trappings of the police procedural, from the disquieting corners of the criminal mind to sheer dread-inducing horror, A Century of Great Suspense Stories is a rich anthology of this popular literary genre, a stunning tribute to the art of storytelling, and to the men and women who have done it best

An anthology of stories Following the huge success of the previous BBM collections comes the latest batch of stories from the UK's top-flight crime writers. Alongside an "Inspector Morse" story from Colin Dexter and a "Rumpole" tale from John Mortimer, is Jake Arnott's first short story and a wealth of exclusive stories from some of Britain's most exciting up-and-coming young crime writers. An ideal present for anyone who has ever enjoyed a good murder-mystery, "The Best British Mysteries 2006" will cause many sleepless nights of avid page turning!

Have yourself a crooked little Christmas with The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries. Edgar Award-winning editor Otto Penzler collects sixty of his all-time favorite holiday crime stories — many of which are difficult or nearly impossible to find anywhere else. From classic Victorian tales by Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Thomas Hardy, to contemporary stories by Sara Paretsky and Ed McBain, this collection touches on all aspects of the holiday season, and all types of mysteries. They are suspenseful, funny, frightening, and poignant. Included are puzzles by Mary Higgins Clark, Isaac Asimov, and Ngaio Marsh; uncanny tales in the tradition of A Christmas Carol by Peter Lovesey and Max Allan Collins; O. Henry-like stories by Stanley Ellin and Joseph Shearing, stories by pulp icons John D. MacDonald and Damon Runyon; comic gems from Donald E. Westlake and John Mortimer; and many, many more. Almost any kind of mystery you’re in the mood for — suspense, pure detection, humor, cozy, private eye, or police procedural — can be found in these pages. FEATURING: — Unscrupulous Santas — Crimes of Christmases Past and Present — Festive felonies — Deadly puddings — Misdemeanors under the mistletoe — Christmas cases for classic characters including Sherlock Holmes, Brother Cadfael, Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot, Ellery Queen, Rumpole of the Bailey, Inspector Morse, Inspector Ghote, A.J. Raffles, and Nero Wolfe

OVER 40 NEW STORIES FROM BRITAIN’S LEADING CRIME WRITERS Leading editor and reviewer Maxim Jakubowski has compiled another beguiling collection of the year’s best new short crime fiction from the UK. Ian Rankin’s perennially popular Edinburgh cop, Inspector Rebus, makes an unexpected comeback in a short, but intriguing story, ‘The Very Last Drop’, and the collection closes with another Rankin story, ‘Driven’. Making their first appearance in the series are many luminaries such as Kate Atkinson, Louise Welsh, Stephen Booth, Christopher Brookmyre, Colin Bateman, A. L. Kennedy, Sheila Quigley, Lin Anderson, Simon Kernick and David Hewson. Also represented are exciting up-and-coming talents such as Nick Quantrill, Jay Stringer, Paul D. Brazill and Nigel Bird

Thirty-five short stories from the top names in British crime fiction, by the likes of Lee Child, Ian Rankin, Alexander McCall Smith, Jake Arnott, Val McDermid, and more

От классической новеллы с головоломкой, которую читатель решает вместе с ее героями, до криминального триллера, полного неожиданных поворотов сюжета, — в сборник вошли только лучшие английские детективы. Кто-то из 32 выдающихся авторов Туманного Альбиона, как Агата Кристи или Артур Конан Дойл, в представлении не нуждается, кто-то станет настоящим открытием