Death Among Us: An Anthology of #MurderMystery #ShortStories #TuesdayBookBlog

On By Teri PolenIn Book Reviews

Who knew death could be so eclectic? Relish this mesmerizing murder mystery mash-up of short stories.

The stories include the 2019 SIA Award-Winning Murder Mystery Short Story ‘The Rose Slayer.’

Murder and mystery have been the staple of literature and films for years. This anthology of short stories will thrill and entertain you. Some will also make you laugh out loud. Others will stop and make you think.

Think of this murder mystery short story anthology as a book version of appetizers or starters, hors d’oeuvre, meze, or antipasti. It can be read as fillers between books or, as is the case in some countries, as a bookish meze – in its own right.

These stories come from an international cast of authors; some with bestselling books, others are emerging or new talents. Their roots, cultures, and life experiences are as diverse as their writing styles.

But one thing binds them together: they know how to tell a story.

There’s murder mystery styles and locations to suit all tastes: detective fiction, serial killers, scifi, histfic, LA, England, The Great Lakes, Las Vegas, the Nevada desert and more in an exquisite exposition of the art of short story telling.

The ten authors who have contributed to the anthology are:

Stephen Bentley
Greg Alldredge
Kelly Artieri
Robbie Cheadle
Michael Spinelli
L. Lee Kane
Kay Castaneda
Aly Locatelli
Justin Bauer
& ‘G’ Posthumously

Each author introduces his or her stories and the theme that lies behind them.By the time you finish the book, you will agree the result is a mesmerizing murder mystery mash-up.

Something I enjoyed about this anthology is the variety.  Yes, the theme is murder, but the stories span different sub-genres – straight up suspense, sci-fi, horror, and historical fiction – basically a smorgasbord of death for murder mystery fans.

My favorite stories include the following:

Justice is Never Served by Robbie Cheadle – Heart-wrenching, but with supernatural overtones, and based on a fictionalized account of occurrences in Victorian England.

Monitaur by Michael Spinelli – Because I’m such a horror fan, this one stuck out for me.  Strange occurrences overheard and seen over a baby monitor.  A chilling tale sure to give you goosebumps.

The Neighbours by Aly Locatelli – Locatelli is a new author, but her story is that of a seasoned writer.  I predicted the ending, but knowing it didn’t detract from this a well-written tale.

Death Among Us is a compelling collection of stories sure to appeal to mystery fans and will keep them reading hours past their bedtime.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from one of the authors.  Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

 

35 thoughts on “Death Among Us: An Anthology of #MurderMystery #ShortStories #TuesdayBookBlog”

  12. Pingback: Death Among Us: An Anthology of #MurderMystery #ShortStories #TuesdayBookBlog – Roberta Writes

  13. Thanks so much for the wonderful review, Teri! Also a big thank you to all the others for their kind comments 🙂

    You are right about SIA, I did give it its full name in my intro at the start of the anthology. You can also find them on Goodreads.

    Thanks again!

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.