Short Story Wednesday: HAUNTINGS edited by Henry Mazzeo (illustrated by Edward Gorey)

This book can be read here, at the Internet Archive (sadly denuded of its jacket).

Contents, all illustrated by Edward Gorey:

Introduction: The Castle of Terror by Henry Mazzeo
"The Lonesome Place" by August Derleth
"In the Vault" by H. P. Lovecraft
"The Man Who Collected Poe" by Robert Bloch
"Where Angels Fear" by Manly Wade Wellman
"Lot No. 249" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
"The Haunted Dolls’ House" by M. R. James
"The Open Door" by Mrs. Oliphant
"Thus I Refute Beelzy" by John Collier
"Levitation" by Joseph Payne Brennan
"The Ghostly Rental" by Henry James
"The Face" by E. F. Benson
"The Whistling Room" by William Hope Hodgson
"The Grey Ones" by J. B. Priestley
"The Stolen Body" by H. G. Wells
"The Red Lodge" by H. Russell Wakefield
"The Visiting Star" by Robert Aickman
"Midnight Express" by Alfred Noyes

This might be one of  the most important books to me among all those I've read. It's certainly, among the four or five horror anthologies I read by the time I was eight, one of only two aimed at adults (the other was the Berkley paperback edited by Hal Cantor, Ghosts and Things), and the one which I remember best (odd how few women's stories were collected in either this or the Cantor, which featured only Shirley Jackson's "The Lovely House" in that wise, though Betty M. Owen's Scholastic Book Services anthologies and the Robert Arthur and Harold Q. Masur Hitchcock anthologies helped redress that balance). Happily for me, perhaps (foolishly) because of the Gorey illustrations, this one was classed in the children's section of the Enfield Central Public Library, where I found it easily enough (not that having to go over to the adult section to find, say, Joan Aiken's collection The Green Flash was any great trial).

This book introduced me to all these geniuses, though of course I'd heard of Sherlock Holmes before reading Doyle's detective-free mummy story here, and had probably seen adaptations of at least some of these folks' works on Night Gallery, or in Bloch's case, his Star Trek scripts, and the George Pal productions of adaptations from that other familiar name, H. G. Wells.

Despite the attempts by some reviewers to claim this book for the ghost story tradition, Mazzeo cast his net considerably wider than that, including revenants other than Doyle's mummy, devils (or at least one Assumes they're devils) in at least one of the wittiest stories here (John Collier lets you know, after all, with his title, and Manly Wade Wellman is only a bit more coy in labeling his tale of a place you don't want to be). M. R. James traps children with a toy, Alfred Noyes with a book; Joseph Payne Brennan, with his best story and one of his shortest, traps the childish, and even H. P. Lovecraft is represented by one of his least self-indulgent stories. Derleth shows what he could do, when not attempting to corrupt Lovecraft's legacy into a Christian metaphor, and Wells's stolen body story is an improvement over the "Elvesham" variation collected by Damon Knight in his The Dark Side. J. B. Priestly, a diverse man of letters, I would next encounter primarily as the author (and reader, for a Spoken Arts recording) of his essay collection Delight, which was indeed delightful; Robert Aickman, while also expert on the waterways of Britain, remained for me and many others the greatest of ghost-story writers of the latter half of the 20th Century, even with Russell Kirk and Joanna Russ and Charles Grant and so many others providing excellent contributions to that literature. That obscure fellow James and E. F. Benson (not yet rediscovered for his Mapp & Lucia comedies of manners, and only one of three prolific Benson brothers in the horror field) were the only writers shared by both this book and the Cantor; the Hodgson is a Carnacki story, a fine introduction to psychic investigators.

And the Gorey illustrations will stay with anyone. This book essentially introduced me to lifelong favorites Bloch, Collier, Benson and Wellman, and even the weakest stories here were rewarding; the Noyes, like the Brennan, is almost certainly the best thing he wrote (at least in prose or the uncanny) and a landmark in the field. I see where Gahan Wilson reviewed this for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1969, Fritz Leiber somewhat belatedly for Fantastic in 1973...I shall have to seek out those reviews [and have, below]...for that matter, I will need to read this book again, eventually, and see how completely all of these have stuck with me. And, as far as I know, Mazzeo never published another book.

And looking at the book at the Internet Archive let me see, for the first time in years (decades?) that Mazzeo thanks prolific (and often horror-fiction) anthologist Seon Manley (usually in tandem with her sister, GoGo Lewis) for assistance on this, again possibly only book. He asked the right editor, clearly.

Further appreciations: 

Gahan Wilson in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April 1969 (Joanna Russ also has reviews in this issue, just before Wilson's occasional column about horror fiction and related matter, "The Dark Corner").

Fritz Leiber in Fantastic, September 1973 (page 110), published around the time I found the book...

And please see Patti Abbott's blog for more of today's short stories...

SSW: Bill Pronzini: new HITCHCOCK'S and QUEEN'S mystery magazine contributions: Short Story Wednesday

Today, after hearing last night the high whine and self-congratulation of our highest elected fictioneer go on at tedious, mendacious length and manage to alienate even his closest counterpart in Canada, Ontario Premier Doug Ford, while as ever trying to fanboyishly, even slavishly, Present Himself for Putin, now we can turn to one of his unelected bureaucrats for helpful hints https://www.rawstory.com/egg-prices/:

US Sec. of Agriculture Brooke Rollins suggests "beating" egg prices by raising backyard chickens...

But we know Rollins is in for a chewing-out, at least, for not floating the notion that we should all be buying Trump Eggs, always wholesome, spray-painted for your convenience either gold or pre-cancerous burnt umber. And with easy credit terms.

And, with luck, we won't die of avian flu as a result, nor as a result of it infecting our neighbors' cows...but this can be thwarted with New Trump Coops! They come with restrictive covenants that don't allow any viruses at all to move in within a thousand yards of your beautiful, sexy Trump Chickens (also available spray-painted gold or burnt umber). Should cover neighboring cattle. If that doesn't work, RFK, Jr. will be hosting (blue-jeans-required) raves on the White House lawn, with mandatory ingestion of steroids and Vitamin K in irresponsible doses, and carrion BBQ to follow.

(Conservative Charlie Sykes, who's left the GOP for the Libertarian Party in the wake of MAGA, put it this way.)

But on to more artful short stories:

"The Back End of Nowhere" by Bill Pronzini, AHMM March/April 2025, the current issue, edited by Linda Landrigan

"Tangled Web" by Bill Pronzini, EQMM March/April 2025, edited by Janet Hutchings and Jackie Sherbow (a Jake Runyon story)

I've been reading Bill Pronzini's fiction for half a century-plus at this point, and consistently enjoying it. Unsurprisingly, he's a Mystery Writers of America Grandmaster, and has been, along with his solo work, the most assiduous fiction-writing collaborator with his similarly talented wife, Marcia Muller, and with the recently late Barry N. Malzberg. His stories in the current Hitchcock's and Queen's are both worth reading, and not atypically of his work, both take a somewhat de-mythologizing approach to, in the AHMM story, a stand-alone revenge tale, and in the EQMM insurance detective series entry...both stories are good, if the Runyon series story a bit better, in part because of more complexity and detail and a bit more heft as result. 

I first read Pronzini's work in back issues of Hitchcock's my local public library kept in the kids' wing of the collection, perhaps because there were digest-sized spinner racks for YA paperbacks there, and perhaps because of the line-drawing illustrations in early-mid '70s issues of AHMM (and for a couple/few decades going forward) misled an unwary librarian or two about their nature...or she (usually the case at Enfield Central Library in the '70s) thought the magazine might hook some young minds. It was my first exposure to it, and in it Pronzini's series of stories about the "Nameless" private eye (eventually "outed" as named Bill), "The Scales of Justice"...in the July 1973 issue. And as I quickly exhausted Robert Arthur's YA-targeted "Alfred Hitchcock" anthologies from Random House, and moved on to his and, after his death, Harold Q. Masur's Alfred Hitchcock Presents: anthos, in hardcover from the library or the Doubleday Book Club, or in oddly-reconfigured Dell paperback editions (usually two paperbound editions drawn from every fat volume in boards0. And nearly all featuing a Pronzini story or so.

One aspect of Pronzini's work, throughout his career, I 've noted above--de-mythologizing crime-fiction tropes...Pronzini characters often realize grand fantasies of revenge are more satisfying to their bearers as fantasies when the realities of revenge become apparent, and the day-to-details of even the more dangerous aspects of private detection work are, very often, indeed quotidian rather than heroic fantasy...necessary work done, and it can take its toll, but that's what we're here for, to help others and get the work done. An early short story title for Pronzini was "Sometimes There is Justice"...sometimes. And often because people did what they needed to do, rather than flashily Set Everything Aright with a well-timed punch to a villain's jaw, or pulling and firing a crack shot through the villain's eye. 

Two good examples here, and you'll find a number of even better ones in his collections, but you probably won't begrudge the 10-spot you'll lay down for each of these issues, perhaps the last or penultimate ones published by Penny Press, as their fiction magazines, and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, as noted here (and a Lot of places) recently have been purchased by a new firm, 1 Paragraph. Interesting that Pronzini gets the cover on the AHMM, and he isn't mentioned (nor is Lia Matera) on the EQMM's cover...feels almost random at times, with the Penny Press titles...

Also, a grandson of the second editor (after Hugo Gernsback) of Amazing Stories, Justin T. O'Connor Sloane, is attempting to make a go of revived Worlds of If and Galaxy Science Fiction magazines in hybrid online/paper format. Robert Silverberg gives guarded if  still interesting responses in an interview conducted by Sloane, and a few familiar names are among the contributors to the first issue of the attempted revival of Galaxy (November 2024), online for free, and the Worlds of If revival, slightly older, has a sample free issue up as well.

I might gather up the Short Story Wednesday entries again this week, as organizer Patti Abbott is probably still enjoying (we hope) her Florida vacation...

Short Story Wednesday: Barry N. Malzberg and Bill Pronzini: FINAL WAR AND OTHER FANTASIES (Ace 1969) and IN THE POCKET AND OTHER SCIENCE FICTION STORIES (Ace 1971) by Barry N. Malzberg: newly offered together; THE HANGING MAN AND OTHER WESTERN STORIES by Bill Pronzini, including one in collaboration with Marcia Muller; Stark House 2024

Barry N. Malzberg,  July 24, 1939-December 19, 2024.

Two sorts of retrospective, the kind of fine work Stark House continues to do...from two writers whose work I've been reading for nearly my whole literate life, Malzberg because my father had anthologies including his work when I was very young (and I would eventually inherit them), Pronzini whose work I would discover only a bit later via Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine and the essentially unrelated (except by paying license fees) Alfred Hitchcock Presents: volumes edited by Harold Q. Masur for Random House (reprinted in Dell paperbacks) in the '70s. As we face our Final Wars and try to avoid joining  the Hanging Man in his fate, this is a propitious time to take in these books, for me those stories I have read are usually decades ago, and those I haven't deserve to have my neglect remedied. 

Barry has also contributed to this blog, and very graciously indeed. Bill Pronzini and Marcia Muller have helped with a few projects of mine (and in her case, a very badly-handled project of one of my bookstore colleagues decades ago). I am glad to have been able to make the acquaintance of both.

Barry N. Malzberg's own writing on this blog:

Quoting Barry Malzberg

Guest FFB: Barry Malzberg and Charles Ardai on the last published Cornell Woolrich novel, as completed by Lawrence Block: INTO THE NIGHT

Cele Goldsmith Lalli, interviewed by Barry Malzberg

guest essay by Barry Malzberg: NEW AMERICAN REVIEW (later AMERICAN REVIEW), edited by Theodore Solotaroff: the best American literary magazine  (for some reason, Blogger has tagged this as featuring sensitive content...I'd say yes, but  not the way they mean it.)

Barry Malzberg's first two collections of his short fantastica stories were published as halves of Ace Doubles (and under his fantastic-fiction pseudonym "K. M. O'Donnell"--a tribute to writers, and married couple, Henry Kuttner and Catherine L. Moore, who among their collaborations signed some of their best as Lawrence O'Donnell), in 1969 paired with a John Rackham novel, and in 1971 with his own novella Gather in the Hall of the Planets. "Final War" has reminded at least two Richards, the late Richard Geis (of Science Fiction Review fame) and Rich Horton (of  Locus, his anthologies and his blog) strongly of Joseph Heller's  Catch-22, and was probably the most widely-admired of Malzberg's early fantastica stories, coming a close second in the balloting for the Nebula Award  in its contest. When asked what he'd like to be remembered for, he told his interlocutor that the latter might note just how funny he could be (since his work is shot through with wit, even at its most anguished). Particularly in the vignettes in these collections, he demonstrates this frequently.

Novella cover illustration by Jack Gaughan;
second cover by Karel Thole

Here are the two tables of contents (from ISFDB):  

[2] Final War and Other Fantasies (frontispiece) • interior artwork by Gray Morrow

• Final War and Other Fantasies • (1969) • collection by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 6 • Introduction (Final War and Other Fantasies) • (1969) • essay by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 9 • Final War • (1968) • novelette by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 42 • Death to the Keeper • (1968) • novelette by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 63 • A Triptych • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 70 • How I Take Their Measure • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 76 • Oaten • (1968) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 85 • The Ascension • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 90 • The Major Incitement to Riot • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 96 • Cop-Out • (1968) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 106 • We're Coming Through the Window • (1967) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 109 • The Market in Aliens • (1968) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 113 • By Right of Succession • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]

In the Pocket and Other S-F Stories • (1971) • collection by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]

• 7 • Introduction to In the Pocket and Other S-F Stories • (1971) • essay by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 9 • In the Pocket • (1970) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 15 • Gehenna • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 23 • Ah, Fair Uranus • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 31 • Notes Just Prior to the Fall • (1970) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 49 • As Between Generations • (1970) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 53 • The Falcon and the Falconeer • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 71 • July 24, 1970 • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 75 • Pacem Est • (1970) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg and Kris Neville [as by Kris Neville and K. M. O'Donnell]
• 83 • The New Rappacini • (1970) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 89 • Bat • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 99 • A Question of Slant • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 103 • What Time Was That? • (1969) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 113 • A Soulsong to the Sad, Silly, Soaring Sixties • [Decades] • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg (variant of A Soul Song to the Sad, Silly, Soaring Sixties) [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 121 • Addendum • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]
• 127 • The Idea • (1971) • short story by Barry N. Malzberg [as by K. M. O'Donnell]

The Stark House edition has only one (new) cover, and Barry has decided to write a single new brief introduction, as he looks back less than fondly at either collection's original introduction; a decent bibliography of his books rounds out the book.

 

Malzberg cover by Jeff Jordan

Pronzini cover by Mark Shepard

The Hanging Man and Other Western Stories by Bill Pronzini

Stark House, December 2024, 204 pp.

Indexed by TM using links from the FictionMags Index.

7 * Preface * Bill Pronzini * in

11 * The Hanging Man, (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine August 12 1981

22 * Markers, (ss) Roundup ed. Stephen Overholser, Doubleday, 1982

28 * Hero, (ss) Small Felonies by Bill Pronzini, St. Martin's, 1988

33 * McIntosh’s Chute, (ss) New Frontiers, Volume I ed. Martin H. Greenberg & Bill Pronzini, Tor, 1990, as by Jack Foxx

43 * Decision, (ss) The Arizonans ed. Bill Pronzini & Martin H. Greenberg, Fawcett Gold Medal, 1989; originally published as 

“I’ll See to Your Horse”, (ss) Zane Grey Western Magazine February 1972; rewritten as the opening of The Gallows Land (Walker and Co., 1983; Berkley pb 1983); this is a composite of both.

49 * All the Long Years, (ss) Westeryear ed. Ed Gorman, M. Evans, 1988

57 * Burglarproof, (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine February 2010

71 * The Gunny, (ss) The Gunfighters ed. Bill Pronzini & Martin H. Greenberg, Fawcett Gold Medal, 1988

76 * Fyfe and the Drummers, (ss) New Frontiers, Volume II ed. Martin H. Greenberg & Bill Pronzini, Tor, 1990

82 * Wooden Indian, (ss) Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine March 1989

93 * The Gambler, (ss) New Frontiers, Volume I ed. Martin H. Greenberg & Bill Pronzini, Tor, 1990

101 * Fear, (ss) Louis L’Amour Western Magazine March 1995

109 * The Cruel and Deadly Winter, (ss) (2024 original publication in this volume)

113 * "Give-a-Damn” Jones, (ss) The First Five Star Western Series Corral ed. Vicki Piekarski, Five Star US, 2000

126 * Righteous Guns, (ss) The Best Western Stories of Bill Pronzini, Swallow Press, 1990

130 * Doc Christmas, Painless Dentist, (ss) Louis L’Amour Western Magazine May 1994

141 *Not a Lick of Sense, (ss) The Fatal Frontier ed. Ed Gorman & Martin H. Greenberg, Carroll & Graf, 1997

147 * "Crucifixion River" by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini; apparently first published in the collection Crucifixion River: Western Stories  (Five Star, 2007; ISBN-13: 978-1594145568)  by Muller and Pronzini (this story won the WWA Spur Award)

202 * Pronzini Bibliography * bi

As the acute scanner might note, there is an overlap with, though not complete duplication of, The Best Western Stories of Bill Pronzini, Swallow Press, 1990...I picked that one up when it was new--at first thought, hard to realize it's been almost 35 years:

The FictionMags Index (FMI) listing:

The Best Western Stories of Bill Pronzini by Bill Pronzini (Swallow Press, March 1990, 0-8040-0932-5, xix+177pp, hc, co-edited by Martin H. Greenberg)
• ix · No East Answers: Bill Pronzini · Robert E. Briney · in
• 1 · The Gambler · Bill Pronzini · ss New Frontiers, Volume I ed. Martin H. Greenberg & Bill Pronzini, Tor, 1990
• 12 · Markers · Bill Pronzini · ss Roundup ed. Stephen Overholser, Doubleday, 1982
• 20 · Wooden Indian · Bill Pronzini · ss Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine March 1989
• 36 · Righteous Guns · Bill Pronzini · ss
• 41 · Fergus O’Hara, Detective · Bill Pronzini · nv Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine March 1974, as “The Riverboat Gold Robbery”; revised.
• 71 · All the Long Years · Bill Pronzini · ss Westeryear ed. Ed Gorman, M. Evans, 1988
• 82 · Decision · Bill Pronzini · ss The Arizonans ed. Bill Pronzini & Martin H. Greenberg, Fawcett Gold Medal, 1989
  originally published as “I’ll See to Your Horse” (ZGW); rewritten as opening of The Gallows Land; this is composite of both.
• 91 · Cave of Ice · Bill Pronzini & Marcia Muller · ss Boys’ Life June 1986
• 101 · The Hanging Man · Bill Pronzini · ss Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine August 12 1981
• 117 · Hero · Bill Pronzini · ss Small Felonies by Bill Pronzini, St. Martin's, 1988
• 125 · McIntosh’s Chute · Bill Pronzini · ss New Frontiers, Volume I ed. Martin H. Greenberg & Bill Pronzini, Tor, 1990, as by Jack Foxx
• 139 · Fyfe and the Drummers · Bill Pronzini · ss New Frontiers, Volume II ed. Martin H. Greenberg & Bill Pronzini, Tor, 1990
• 147 · No Room at the Inn [John Quincannon & Sabina Carpenter] · Bill Pronzini · ss Crime at Christmas ed. Jack Adrian, Equation, 1988
• 162 · The Western Pulps · Bill Pronzini · ar
  portions of this article first appeared as part of the introduction to Wild Westerns ed. Bill Pronzini (Walker & Co., 1989).
• 171 · The Bibliography of Books by Bill Pronzini · [uncredited] · bi

For more of today's short stories, please see Patti Abbott's blog.

SSW/FFB: HITCHCOCK IN PRIME TIME edited by Francis M. Nevins, Jr. and Martin H. Greenberg (Avon 1985)

(Avon Books, August 1985, 0-380-89673-7, $9.95, 356pp, trade pb, anthology)    Can be read here.

1  Introduction ·  Henry Slesar  · in

The 1955-56 Season 

8 · And So Died Riabouchinska · Ray Bradbury · ss The Saint Detective Magazine June/July 1953

23 · The Orderly World of Mr. Appleby · Stanley Ellin · ss Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine #78, May 1950

44 · Momentum · Cornell Woolrich · nv Detective Fiction Weekly December 14 1940, as “Murder Always Gathers Momentum”

The 1956-57 Season

77 · The Better Bargain · Richard Deming · ss Manhunt April 1956

88 · The Hands of Mr. Ottermole · Thomas Burke · nv The Story-teller February 1929

109 · The Dangerous People · Fredric Brown · ss Dime Mystery Magazine March 1945, as “No Sanctuary”

121 · Enough Rope for Two · Clark Howard · ss Manhunt February 1957

137 · Suburban Tigress · Lawrence Treat · ss Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine July 1957

152 · The Day of the Execution · Henry Slesar · ss Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine June 1957

The 1957-58 Season

163 · The $2,000,000 Defense · Harold Q. Masur · ss Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine May 1958

181 · The Dusty Drawer · Harry Muheim · ss Collier’s May 3 1952

The 1959-60 Season

199 · Backward, Turn Backward · Dorothy Salisbury Davis · nv Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine #127, June 1954

The 1962-63 Season

225 · Hangover · John D. MacDonald · ss Cosmopolitan July 1956

238 · Hangover · Charles W. Runyon · ss Manhunt December 1960 

The 1963-64 Season

254 · A Home Away from Home · Robert Bloch · ss Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine June 1961

264 · Terror Town · Ellery Queen · nv Argosy August 1956

294 · Anyone for Murder? · Jack Ritchie · ss Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine January 1964 

The 1964-65 Season

310 · One of the Family · James Yaffe · ss Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine May 1956

330 · Death Scene · Helen Nielsen · ss Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine May 1963

342 · Winter Run · Edward D. Hoch · ss Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine January 1965

For whatever reason, this rather obvious project (an anthology of stories adapted by Alfred Hitchcock Presents: and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour) saw only one trade paperback edition from Avon, in 1985, toward the earlier years of the mass influx of Martin Greenberg anthologies, and coinciding with the 1985 latter-day revival of Alfred Hitchcock Presents: (one season broadcast on NBC, then three more seasons cablecast on the USA Network channel); the acknowledgements pages are misleading, and verge on useless, but, happily, along with Henry Slesar's introduction to the volume, the living and game writers (for some reason, Ray Bradbury chose not to) supplied brief but useful or at least interesting notes about the fiction and its adaptation, even when (as with Stanley Ellin), the writer in question has no clear firsthand memory of the adaptation (or, in his case, even seeing it). Co-editor Francis Nevins supplies afterwords for those writers who were already gone or unwilling (even John D. MacDonald, still ticked in 1985 that Shamley Productions had the odd idea of flanging together his story with one of the same title by Charles Runyon for that script, is game to let us know about this; Runyon not much less puzzled, but happy enough to get the check).

At least two of these stories had also made their way into "Hitchcock" anthologies I'd read in the '70s, Robert Bloch's 1961 story "A Home Away from Home" (Bloch notes that he enjoyed expanding the brief short story, an Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine Poe-inspired-contest-winner, when adapting it for the AH Hour adaptation; Bloch would also employ a version of the story as the framing device for his later anthology film-script for Asylum), in Alfred Hitchcock's Noose Report (1966), one of the Dell paperbacks which were essentially best-ofs from AHMM, and Harry Muheim's "The Dusty Drawer", which leads off Robert Arthur's brilliant 1969 anthology for Random House, Alfred Hitchcock Presents: A Month of Mystery (online here), as well as the Dell paperback first-volume (of 2) reprint, AHP: Dates with Death. 

A book well worth having, as well as reading, even given the odd skipping through the seasons of the original television series. One wonders if there was some intention on the part of the editors to make a more comprehensive survey of the stories adapted for the program. Additionally, it's not the worst survey of the sorts of crime fiction one could find in magazines in the (for the most part) 1950s and '60s.

Jack Seabrook corrects Muheim's memory of the previous television adaptation of his "The Dusty Drawer" in his review of the AHP: episode and, in passing, this anthology in this Bare Bones post.

Short Story Wednesday: DOLLS ARE MURDER edited by Harold Q. Masur (an MWA Anthology, Lion Books 1957)

(a redux post)

index put together from various, mostly Contento and Stephensen-Payne sources:

Dolls are Murder, "from the Mystery Writers of America," edited by Harold Q. Masur. Lion Books, 1957, "by arrangement with Revere Publishing Corp." 126 pp. 25c mm pb. Cover by Mort Kuntsler.

7 · Human Interest Stuff · Brett Halliday · ss Adventure Sep ’38; EQMM Sep ’46
20 · The Homesick Buick · John D. MacDonald · ss EQMM Sep ’50
34 · I’ll Be Waiting · Raymond Chandler · ss The Saturday Evening Post Oct 14 ’39
51 · Mind Over Matter · Ellery Queen· ss Blue Book October 1939
73 · The Doctor Makes It Murder [Dr. Paul Standish] · George Harmon Coxe · ss Cosmopolitan Sep ’42 (reprinted in The Saint Detective Magazine as "The Doctor Calls It Murder," Oct '57)
92 · The Dog Died First · Bruno Fischer · nv Mystery Book Magazine Fll ’49
115· Affaire Ziliouk [Monsieur Froget] · Georges Simenon; trans. by Anthony Boucher · ss Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, May 1944; translated from Les 13 Coupables (1932).
122· Cop’s Gift · Rex Stout · ss What’s New Dec ’53 [as “Tough Cop’s Gift”]; EQMM Jan ’56 [as "Santa Claus Beat"]

So here's a slim, inexpensive (even for the time) paperback with at best a misleading title (but, thoughtfully, the MWA was kind enough to leave all the women writers out of this antho), inasmuch as some of these stories, such as "Brett Halliday"'s deft excursion into "B. Traven" territory, have no women to speak of in them (oh, wait...a minor character at the beginning is killed by the father of a young woman the mc insulted...dat's a deadly dame, doncha know). Likewise, the woman character in the JDMc story is notable mostly for being the only female character, and far less deadly than several of the males; she in fact commits no murder. But it's a solid little book, filled with stories that have become at least borderline chestnuts in the succeeding years, such as the Bruno Fischer story I first read in the Hitchcock Presents: volume I FFB'd the other week, a series, I'll note (somewhat redundantly) that Masur would eventually edit after founding editor Robert Arthur died. And the book rounds out with its shortest story, published under three different titles (I'm guessing that the title here, "Cop's Gift," might've been "Rex Stout"'s preferred one), a neat if not exactly challenging little mystery set on Christmas Eve, with the typical Stout wit and eye for small details (and not a Wolfe/Goodwin story). Much as this book itself was part of a seasonal gift from Kate Laity.

For more of this week's Wednesday's Short Stories, please see Patti Abbott's blog.