Reviews

The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries by Otto Penzler

caribbeangirlreading's review against another edition

3.0

I only read the four short stories "required" by book club. They all took place at Christmastime but none had Christmas spirit. They were also too short to be satisfying.

carina's review against another edition

mysterious

3.0

A lot of these stories were a miss for me, but a few were really great (Agatha Christie's "Adventure of the Plum Pudding" is pure GOLD). 

kwil's review against another edition

5.0

I really look forward to reading this each year, and I still haven’t made it through all of the stories. The assortment is outstanding, with some pretty well-known tales (The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding by Agatha Christie, Christmas Party by Rex Stout) alongside some more obscure or forgotten titles (at least for me-I’d never heard of Ed Gorman’s The Christmas Kitten before, one of my favorites). The stories are divided into helpful categories (A Pulpy Little Christmas, A Scary Little Christmas, A Modern Little Christmas) and are short enough (a few are a mere 4 - 5 pages!) even St. Nick could steal a few moments away to enjoy one or two. Before each story is a short and usually insightful section about the author, and Penzler has written a wonderful introduction piece to start everything off. If you find yourself in need of a fast mystery fix amid the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, pick up The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries. It’s 654 pages of criminally entertaining yuletide delights.

zwilde's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced

• Strong character development? N/A
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

mwgerard's review against another edition

5.0

Please read my full review here:
http://mwgerard.com/review-the-big-book-of-christmas-mysteries/

balancinghistorybooks's review against another edition

4.0

I could not resist purchasing The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries this year, and began to read it as soon as it was December. It is a chunky and clunky tome, so I decided from the off to spread my reading of it out over a few days. I had initially decided to read one of the sections per day so that it would last me all of advent, but I ended up reading far more of it on some days than others, and finished it in just under a week.

The stories here, as mentioned above, are split into rather a lot of sections, including 'Puzzling', 'Sherlockian', 'Modern', 'Funny', and 'Scary'. The collection is a compendium which features the work of the likes of Agatha Christie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Ngaio Marsh, Thomas Hardy, and Colin Dexter. I had read several of these stories before, but a lot of them were new to me. As I expect with such a varied collection, some of the tales were not at all my style (the hardboiled and modern ones particularly), but there were others which I adored. The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries is a wonderful tome to dip in and out of, and it can be dug out and read from one year to the next. It would also make a great volume for newcomers to crime fiction; the contents here are so different, and encompass so many periods, that everyone is sure to find something that they love.

My favourite stories are as follows:
- 'The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding' by Agatha Christie (RR)
- 'The Butler's Christmas Eve' by Mary Roberts
- 'The Trinity Cat' by Ellis Peters
- 'The Thieves Who Couldn't Help Sneezing' by Thomas Hardy
- 'A Scandal in Winter' by Gillian Linscott
- 'The Christmas Client' by Edward D. Hoch
- 'The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle' by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (RR)
- 'The Carol Singers' by Josephine Bell (RR)
- 'Waxworks' by Ethel Lina White
- 'Cambric Tea' by Marjorie Bowen
- 'Blue Christmas' by Peter Robinson
- 'Death on the Air' by Ngaio Marsh (RR)
- 'A Christmas Tragedy' by Agatha Christie (RR)