The Mysterious Bookshop Presents the Best Mystery Stories of the Year: 2024

“’It’s hardly surprising that crime fiction, with its insistence upon one inarguable ending and a landscape in which the guilty are punished and the innocent freed to continue with their lives, should be so valued right now.’”

There are multiple ways to explore this hefty, 385-page collection of 20 stories: Read them one at a time, in sequence, discovering and rediscovering some of the most powerful crime fiction writers of this time. Or start with the authors whose names you recognize, like Jeffery Deaver and Ace Atkins. Or dip into the doubled author annotations for each piece, one at the start that fills you in on the author’s “credits” and the other at the end of the story giving a dip into the writer’s thoughts about why the tale had to be told and how.

But the very best route into the collection may be to soak slowly into the two opening pieces: a foreword from mystery bookseller and friend of authors Otto Penzler, and an introduction from Anthony Horowitz, who edited this assemblage. Penzler, who owns The Mysterious Bookstore and makes this series an annual delight through The Mysterious Press, gives a fine salute to how the stories are found and puzzled over. Horowitz’s Introduction, though, is subtitled “Crime Fiction and the Truth,” and it’s a must-read. He points out the ironies and massive uncertainties and fears of this season and wraps up this way: “So it’s hardly surprising that crime fiction, with its insistence upon one inarguable ending and a landscape in which the guilty are punished and the innocent freed to continue with their lives, should be so valued right now.”

The stories here range in setting, protagonists, darkness, and sense of what justice should be. Although women make up a minority of the authors—about one third—there are plenty of sharp women in the stories. One of the memorable ones is Elise Williams in John M. Floyd’s story “Last Day at the Jackrabbit.” The Jackrabbit is a diner, and one delicious line in here is spoke pretty sympathetically: “You shot the wrong kind of killer.” Savor each twist, because the last line is going to be (yes it is) a killing final sentence. Floyd’s story isn’t just worth reading multiple times—it’s a story worth telling to a friend or neighbor, because life and death surely can braid and twist like this.

Dan Pope’s “Snow over Hartford” demonstrates that the ironies of noir can come with pain and tenderness. Read Annie Reed’s “Dead Names” and it’s impossible to forget the double meaning that this phrase carries. In Anna Scotti’s hands, “It’s Not Even Past” pulls history and murder into the same room and demonstrates powerful loss within its taut pages.

Finally, the 20th story is one from L. Frank Baum, best know for his books set in Oz. But “The Suicide of Kiaros” is a nasty tale that’s hard to mesh with Dorothy and her allies seeking justice from the man behind the curtain. Call it memorably unpleasant, and that nails another aspect of the darkest crime fiction, doesn’t it?

The timing of this release is good for autumn travels, but it’s also a first salvo toward stacking up gifts for the year’s big holidays ahead. Because the stories vary so much, it’s a great bet for gifting to mystery and crime fiction readers—one of the 20 stories, and probably quite a few more, will offer the opportunity of expanding the reader’s delight in this genre.

Then, of course, it will be time to return to the Horowitz introduction and reflect again, as this author and producer does: “As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become troubled. Why do I love crime fiction? Why does anyone?” Several answers may linger, thanks to this wide-ranging collection.