2014 The Best American Mystery Stories edited by Laura Lippman

 

This anthology of mystery stories offers the best from 2014, as edited by Laura Lippman.  The authors include those familiar to most mystery readers as well as lesser-known individuals.  Authors include Megan Abbott, Daniel Alarcon, Jim Allyn, Jodi Angel, Russell Banks, James Lee Burke, Patricia Engel, Ernest Finney, Roxane Gay, Michelle Butler Hallett, Charlaine Harris, Joseph Heller, David Ingram, Ed Kurtz, Matthew Neill Null, Annie Proulx, Scott Loring Sanders, Nancy Pauline Simpson, Dennis Tafoya and Laura Van Den Berg.

My favorite story was Antarctica by Van Den Berg.  A woman has gone to Antarctica after receiving notification that her brother, a scientist, has been involved in an accident there and is presumed dead.  Due to the remoteness of the location, she stays at a neighboring scientific station and talks to those who knew her brother.  As she reflects on his death, she is reminded of the guilty secret she carried for years, the knowledge of a crime against his wife in her childhood that played a part in her disappearance years later as an adult.  

After all the stories, there was a nice feature.  Each author talked about the genesis of the story and why they loved it.  It was quite interesting to read about how authors get their ideas and how those ideas evolve into stories where the author can rearrange facts to make the situation make sense to them.  This book is part of an annual series and anthology readers should seek these out.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.