Mystery maven Penzler has gathered 17 stories from top writers for an all-original suspense anthology with results that are about the same as if a master chocolatier had assembled a new sampler box: everything of high quality but with enough variety to appeal to all tastes. All the contributors are true to their own very familiar voices. Ed McBain's "Improvisation," a chilling story of two young actresses who commit murder to learn what it feels like, is cut-to-the-bone sharp. In the haunting "Cielo Azul," Michael Connelly allows both detective Harry Bosch and profiler Terry McCaleb to brood, as only they can, about a murder victim never identified. In "Dear Penthouse Forum (A First Draft)," Laura Lippman uses an original format to showcase a truly frightening woman with a most unusual collecting mania who preys on men in airports. S.J. Rozan's "The Last Kiss" features a dangerous woman who's all the more dangerous because at first she seems so sympathetic. Jeffrey Deaver's "Born Bad" is a brilliant double play, with tight characterizations and an unforgettable plot twist. It's a joy to watch these talented authors, who also include J.A. Jance, Elmore Leonard, Walter Mosley and Joyce Carol Oates, embrace the short story form and produce magic. Agent, Nat Sobel. (Jan. 5) Forecast: Backed by blurbs from Janet Evanovich and Robert B. Parker, this all-star anthology will do better (and probably very well) with the crime and suspense crowd than with fans of traditional whodunits. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Can you guess the theme of this anthology? Seventeen stories by crime stars including Michael Connelly, Nelson DeMille, J.A. Jance, Elmore Leonard, Laura Lippman, Ed McBain, Walter Mosley, Joyce Carol Oates, and Anne Perry.--Ann Kim Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Seventeen new stories parade the fair sex at its foulest. With a few notable exceptions, most of the A-list contributors are so intent on showing off their bad girls' nastiness that they don't do anything else. Nelson DeMille's Vietnamese sniper picks off nine members of a recon patrol before letting the tenth go free. Laura Lippman's airport pickup isn't (surprise!) the mouse she seems. Ed McBain's hapless schlep meets a pair of women who like to play murderous games. Tensions smolder among three sisters in Anne Perry's post-WWI beachfront idyll. J.A. Jance's unhappy bride schemes against her cheating husband. Elmore Leonard's small-town girl rides her relationship with Pretty Boy Floyd to tabloid glory. Other contributors from Michael Connelly to Andrew Klavan to Joyce Carol Oates are equally content to strike a haunting note instead of composing a tune. The welcome exceptions don't just embody editor Penzler's title but play with it. Thomas H. Cook's and S.J. Rozan's heroines both want a man to help them do the most horrible thing imaginable. Ian Rankin shows a censor flimflammed by a prisoner's cheating wife. Jeffery Deaver works overtime mapping the trajectory of a lonely mother's bad-seed daughter. Best of all is the densely plotted tale of a clever New York shamus's comeuppance by Walter Mosley, who evidently never heard that his contribution was supposed to be at once full-blooded in its passions and anemic in its development. Agency: Sobel Weber Associates

DANGEROUS WOMEN is an outstanding mystery anthology, with nary a dud and many star turns by five actors reading the likes of Nelson DeMille, Joyce Carol Oates, Anne Perry, and Elmore Leonard, certainly a personal best for Editor Otto Penzler. And praises be, the narrator of each story is identified as the story begins. Alan Sklar’s deep, velvet voice has just enough grit in it to create a delicious sense of danger. Michael Prichard provides deadpan wit in readings with a slightly steely tang. Patrick Lawlor ably handles the stories narrated by younger men, and Ellen Archer’s warm, contemporary voice, the women. These two even switch mid-sentence when the narrative voice breaks off in Laura Lippman’s wonderfully creepy “Dear Penthouse Forum.” Additional pluses are the three-minute tracks, and notations on each disc of the stories on it and the track at which each begins. A terrific production. B.G. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine