Friday's "Forgotten" Books; the links to the reviews: 26 February 2016

Down There film tie-in edition

This week's links to the books reviewed, cited or otherwise dealt with below, in the weekly roundelay sponsored by Patricia Abbott, continental wanderer particularly in cold months. Patti will be hosting again next week.

Sergio Angelini: Vespers by "Ed McBain" (Evan Hunter)

Frank Babics: "Murder in the Dark" by Hugh Pentecost

Yvette Banek: 2015 in books and reviews

Joe Barone: The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra by Vaseem Khan

Elgin Bleecker: Perfidia by James Ellroy

Fred Blosser: The Threateners by Donald Hamilton

Paul D. Brazill: Small Change by Andrez Bergen

Bill Crider: The Doctor's Son by John O'Hara; If: Worlds of Science Fiction: every issue online

Scott A. Cupp: Carter and Lovecraft by Jonathan L. Howard

Martin Edwards: The Ponson Case by Freeman Wills Crofts

Curt Evans: The Wailing Rock Murders by Clifford Orr

Fred Fitch: Levine by Donald Westlake

Ed Gorman: Down There by David Goodis

"John Grant": Album Leaf (aka The Spider in the Cup) by Marjorie Bowen (originally published as by "Joseph Shearing")

Rich Horton: Ares Express by Ian McDonald

Jerry House: Evening Tales for the Winter edited by Henry St. Clair

George Kelley: The Best of the Best, Volume 2: 20 Years of the Best Short Science Fiction Novels edited by Gardner Dozois (see also under Bill Pronzini, below)

Margot Kinberg: The Lying Down Room by Anna Jaquiery

Rob Kitchen: Dark Star by Alan Furst

B. V. Lawson: The Labours of Hercules by Agatha Christie

Steve Lewis: The Treasure at Loatani Point by Riall W. Nolan; Death on the Rocks by John B. West; My Life is Done by Sara Woods

Rod Lott: Jaws 2: The Making of a Sequel by Louis R. Pisano and Michael A. Smith

Todd Mason: Worlds of If: A Retrospective Anthology edited by Frederik Pohl, Martin Harry Greenberg and Joseph Olander; TQ 20 edited by Reginald Gibbons and Susan Hahn (see also Bill Crider, above)

Carol Matic: The Wheel on the School by Miendert DeJong

Jeff Meyerson: Even the Wicked and Murder in the Navy by "Richard Marsten" (Evan Hunter)

Neer: Ninety Three by Victor Hugo (translation unspecified)

John F. Norris: She Who Was No More by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac (translation by Geoffrey Sainsbury)

Mathew Paust: Faces of the Gone by Brad Parks

Bill Pronzini and George Kelley (and Jeffrey Marks): People vs. Withers & Malone by Stuart Palmer and "Craig Rice"

James Reasoner: Pursuit by Lewis B. Patten

Richard Robinson: The Mammoth Book of Sherlock Holmes Abroad edited by Simon Clark (etc.)

Gerard Saylor: The Order of the Forge by Victor Gischler and Tazio Betin

Steve Scott: The Good Old Stuff by John D. MacDonald (and the stories as first published)

Kerrie Smith: Missing by Melanie Casey

Kevin Tipple: Top Suspense: Favorite Kills by the members of the Top Suspense Group

"TomCat": The Witness on the Roof by Annie Hayes

Tracy K: Pashazade by John Courtenay Grimwood

Bonus citations: 
2009 saw two rather clangorous anniversaries: the 60th anniversary of the founding of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and the half-century anniversary of the first broadcast of The Twilight Zone, which among other effects had inspired a magazine that offered a lot of good fiction and more in its run from 1981-1989; it also had a companion magazine, Night Cry, for a few years. F&SF editor and publisher Gordon Van Gelder and TZ magazine co-publisher, and widow of Rod Serling, Carol Serling decided to put together impressive,  fat anthologies, his a retrospective on what his magazine had published, hers an anthology of new stories inspired by the series in some manner, that I've been meaning to review for some years, but haven't gotten around to reading...just dug them out from the stacks as I pack up my old apartment. But this won't stop me from making a few comments...perhaps it's also notable that both anthologies would have direct sequels, as they presumably did well enough and there was always room for more gems from the one magazine, and contributions to the issues of the other we weren't ever to see published (TZ the magazine was an OMNI-like gamble, on the part of Montcalm Publishing, most notable previously for the Penthouse competitor skin magazine Gallery, on publishing a magazine that touched on the fantasticated beyond solely sexual fantasy).

• Publication: The Very Best of Fantasy & Science Fiction: 60th Anniversary Anthology
• Editor: Gordon Van Gelder
• Year: 2009-09-00
• ISBN: 978-1-892391-91-9 [1-892391-91-0]
• Publisher: Tachyon Publications
• Price: $15.95
• Pages: 475

• 9 • Introduction (The Very Best of Fantasy & Science Fiction: 60th Anniversary Anthology) • essay by Gordon Van Gelder
• 11 • Of Time and Third Avenue • (1951) • shortstory by Alfred Bester
• 21 • All Summer in a Day • (1954) • shortstory by Ray Bradbury
• 29 • One Ordinary Day, with Peanuts • (1955) • shortstory by Shirley Jackson
• 41 • A Touch of Strange • (1958) • shortstory by Theodore Sturgeon
• 55 • Eastward Ho! • (1958) • shortstory by William Tenn
• 71 • Flowers for Algernon • (1959) • novelette by Daniel Keyes
• 101 • Harrison Bergeron • (1961) • shortstory by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. [as by Kurt Vonnegut ]
• 109 • This Moment of the Storm • (1966) • novelette by Roger Zelazny
• 141 • The Electric Ant • (1969) • shortstory by Philip K. Dick
• 161 • The Deathbird • (1973) • novelette by Harlan Ellison
• 191 • The Women Men Don't See • (1973) • novelette by James Tiptree, Jr.
• 221 • I See You • (1976) • shortstory by Damon Knight
• 235 • The Gunslinger • [Roland] • (1978) • novelette by Stephen King
• 279 • The Dark • (1991) • shortstory by Karen Joy Fowler
• 297 • Buffalo • (1991) • shortstory by John Kessel
• 315 • Solitude • [Hainish] • (1994) • novelette by Ursula K. Le Guin
• 343 • Mother Grasshopper • (1997) • shortstory by Michael Swanwick
• 361 • macs • (1999) • shortstory by Terry Bisson
• 371 • Creation • (2002) • shortstory by Jeffrey Ford
• 383 • Other People • (2001) • shortstory by Neil Gaiman
• 387 • Two Hearts • [Last Unicorn] • (2005) • novelette by Peter S. Beagle
• 423 • Journey into the Kingdom • (2006) • novelette by M. Rickert
• 451 • The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate • (2007) • novelette by Ted Chiang

• Publication: Twilight Zone: 19 Original Stories on the 50th Anniversary
• Editors: Carol Serling
• Year: 2009-09-01
• ISBN: 978-0-765-32433-7 [0-765-32433-4]
• Publisher: Tor
• Price: $14.99
• Pages: 448
• Introduction • essay by Carol Serling
• Genesis • shortfiction by David Hagberg
• A Haunted House of Her Own • shortfiction by Kelley Armstrong
• On the Road • shortfiction by William F. Wu
• The Art of the Miniature • shortfiction by Earl Hamner
• Benchwarmer • shortfiction by Mike Resnick and Lezli Robyn
• Truth or Consequences • shortfiction by Carole Nelson Douglas
• Puowaina • shortfiction by Alan Brennert
• Torn Away • shortfiction by Joe R. Lansdale
• Vampin' Down the Avenue • shortfiction by Timothy Zahn
• A Chance of a Ghost • shortfiction by Lucia St. Clair Robson
• The Street That Time Forgot • shortfiction by Deborah Chester
• The Wrong Room • shortfiction by R. L. Stine
• Ghost Writer • shortfiction by Robert J. Serling
• The Soldier He Needed to Be • shortfiction by Jim DeFelice
• Ants • shortfiction by Tad Williams
• Your Last Breath, Inc. • shortfiction by John Miller
• Family Man • shortfiction by Laura Lippman
• The Good Neighbor • shortfiction by Whitley Strieber
• El Moe • shortfiction by Rod Serling

The first thing I'd note about the F&SF anthology is the mostly very sapient choices of stories...whether the almost necessary ones ("All Summer in a Day" from Bradbury, "Harrison Bergeron" from Vonnegut, "One Ordinary Day" from Shirley Jackson, and of course "Flowers for Algernon" from Keyes), but also such less compelled choices as "The Deathbird" from Ellison and "I See You" from Knight...and opting for a Zelazny other than "A Rose for Ecclesiastes"; the only real clunker in the bunch, I'd suggest, is "The Gunslinger" by Stephen King, which struck me on first reading as perhaps the worst story I'd read so far or at least certainly the worst by King (who had already come close at least a couple of times, as with "The Cat from Hell").  What I note about the TZ selection is that many of the best and most interesting (or even sustainedly commercial) writers are left off the front cover, which seems odd...and the only genuinely bad writer of the bunch, at least in my experience, is Whitley Strieber (even if I've yet to read a completely successful prose fiction by Rod Serling himself, either, as opposed to decent work in prose by his brother Robert)...but I'll have to get back to you to say whether the Karen Joy Fowler or Joe R. Lansdale stories are items they'll be remembered for.

Out about the same time...