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To paraphrase Forrest Gump, anthologies are often like a box of chocolates – you never know what you're gonna get. The best ones offer a little bit of everything, like that box of assorted chocolates.
ROGUE WAVE, 29 short stories by New England authors, will satisfy your craving for crime fiction, with little bites of stories that range from humorous yarns to dark tales. Some are written by novelists or short story writers with much experience; others are the first publication credit for an author. While the stories were all penned by New England authors, they don't all take place in the region (although many do).
The anthology, edited by Mark Ammons, Katherine Fast, Barbara Ross and Leslie Wheeler, opens with "Lamplighter By The Sea," by Michael Nethercott. The story won the Al Blanchard award, which is sponsored by the Crime Bake Conference. Set in the 1800s in Nantucket, it's a chilling Poe-like tale of a young man who plans revenge for his father's death - but gets more in the bargain.
Other stories are told by detectives, killers and even victims. In "Stroke of Genius," Maurissa Guibord gives us a complete story in just a few pages, another story of revenge, this one involving an artist.
For humor, there's "Mrs. Featherpatch Cooks Up a Murder," by Janet Halpin. An actress who plays a Jessica Fletcher-type role helps solve a crime, and finds some romance along the way. Equally funny is the tongue-in-cheek "Murder (Redux) in Paradise," by Douglas D. Hall, narrated by a writer who has been killed and is investigating his own death from the afterlife. He has a whole room of suspects: other writers who were at a convention for ClueMasters, the New England Society for Crime Writers.
Gerald Elias, author of the Daniel Jacobus mystery series, gives us a classic puzzle mystery in "Christmas Concerto."And there's a historical mystery in "The Blessing Witch," by Kathy Lynn Emerson, set in 1570 and featuring a local herb woman who quickly and efficiently solves a murder.
There are some chilling tales here, too. In Tom Sweeney's "Payback," a jilted woman spots her ex-boyfriend and plans the perfect murder - maybe. "The Jewel Box," by VR Barkowski, is set in New Orleans, that city of voodoo and spirits. Not surprisingly, a haunted shotgun house in the French Quarter features prominently.
With such diverse, well-written stories, there is something certain to be to your taste.
§ Lourdes Venard is a newspaper editor in Long Island, N.Y.
Reviewed by Lourdes Venard, January 2015
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