Otto Penzler rounds up the most cunning, ruthless, criminals in mystery fiction. The best mysteries — whether detective, historical, police procedural, cozy, or comedy-have one thing in common: a memorable culprit. For all the heroes in earnest pursuit, there are malefactors on the loose, determined to outfox their efforts and sow trouble in their wake. These are the rogues and villains who haunt our imaginations, but they often have more in common with their heroic counterparts than we might expect (and, as we shall see, some even moonlight as detectives or do-gooders themselves). The seventy-two handpicked stories in this collection introduce us to the miscreants who have schemed and slashed their way through the mystery canon over the past hundred and fifty years, captivating and confounding readers in the process. MEET DELINQUENT PSYCHES OF ALL STRIPES, INCLUDING gentleman thieves, calculating crooks, fearsome body snatchers, masters of disguise, morally-challenged lawyers, deceitful doctors, heinous hit men. charismatic con men, amoral adventurers, supernatural suspects, deviant detectives, vile villainesses, and cold-blooded killers IN UNFORGETTABLE TALES BY Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, Washington Irving, Jack London, L. T. Meade, 0. Henry, Sinclair Lewis, Edgar Wallace, Leslie Charteris, Erle Stanley Gardner, Edward 0. Hoch, David Morrell, Loren D. Estleman, and countless others

Ten novelettes of murder and mystery from the pulp writer and author of The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. Raised above his father’s Toronto bookstore, Vincent Starrett grew to love books, especially mysteries like those of Arthur Conan Doyle. Over the course of his career, Starrett was a reporter, critic, and novelist. He also wrote mystery stories for pulp magazines, creating his fair share of unique characters, brought to life in this collection of thrilling mystery novelettes . . . In “The Blue Door,” two young men, searching for one last drink after a Saturday night of partying, find themselves in a predicament the likes of which only well-known mystery writer Bartlett Honeywell can solve. In “Too Many Sleuths,” bibliophile bookseller and amateur sleuth G. Washington Troxell investigates the case of a murdered spinster with the help of his friend, crime reporter Frederick Dellabough. In “The Woman in Black,” veteran journalist Volney Kingston can usually figure out any conundrum life throws his way, but when a mysterious woman clad all in black begins following him around, he must turn to famed Chicago private investigator Jimmy Lavender. Other featured stories include “The Fingernail Clue,” “The Wrong Stairway,” “The Street of Idols,” “A Volume of Poe,” “The Skylark,” “The Ace of Clubs,” and “Out There in the Dark.”