OxCrimes: 27 Killer Stories from the Cream of Crime Writers

by Peter Florence (Editor), Mark Ellingham (Editor), Ian Rankin (Introduction and contributor)

For 2014, Oxfam and Profile have turned to crime in order to raise a further £200,000 for Oxfam's work.

OxCrimes is introduced by Ian Rankin and has been curated by Peter Florence, director of Hay Festival, where it was launched in May.

Profile have raised more than a quarter of a million pounds for Oxfam by publishing OxTales (2009) and OxTravels (2011).

Introduction - Ian Rankin
The Dead Their Eyes Implore Us - George Pelecanos
The Case of Death and Honey - Neil Gaiman
Buy and Bust - Simon Lewis
I've Seen That Movie Too - Val McDermid
Caught Short - Anthony Horowitz
The Sin of Dreams - Walter Mosley
Five Francs Each - Fred Vargas
An Afternoon - Ian Rankin
Juror 8 - Stuart Neville
Face Value - Stella Duffy
Not Tommy Johnson - John Harvey
You'll Never Forget My Face - Peter James
The Calm Before - Denise Mina
The Ladder - Adrian McKinty
Venice is Sinking into the Sea - James Sallis
My Life as a Killer - Maxim Jakubowski
The Caterpillar Flag - Christopher Fowler
Reflections in Unna - Louise Welsh
People Just Don't Listen - Peter Robinson
The Honey Trap - Anne Zouroudi
The Spinster - Ann Cleeves
Diagnosis: Murder - Martyn Waites
Trouble at the Institute for the Study of Forgiveness - Alexander McCall Smith
The House of Susan Lulham - Phil Rickman
Underneath the Mistletoe Last Night - Mark Billingham
The Children of Dr Lyall - John Connolly
Black Sky - Yrsa Sigurdardottir
Afterword - Mark Goldring, Oxfam

Genres: Short Stories, Crime, Fiction, Mystery, Anthologies, Ebooks, Thriller

464 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

Reviews

[Labijose · Rating 4 out of 5]

27 relatos breves, algunos de gran calidad, otros bastante prescindibles. Es decir, lo normal en este tipo de recopilaciones. Pero hay al menos siete u ocho que justifican plenamente la lectura de todo el conjunto. Además, la gran mayoría de las aportaciones vienen de autores consagrados a nivel internacional.

Creo que es una obra para leer entre lectura y lectura de otras de mayor calado. O para aprovechar ratos muertos. Si te gusta el género, sabrás sacarle partido.

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

All for a good cause – 3*

I really, really wanted to finish this because it’s driving me nuts that it’s been on my Goodreads for two months at the top and I’ve barely made any progress. Well, that’s because of assignments and prioritising Destiel fanfic over actual books. After this collection, I don’t really blame myself: ‘from the cream of crime writers’. Some of the ‘cream’ must have went off because some of these stories were crap and disappointing – they could have at least put some more effort in. Some of these stories were insanely good and it’s so frustrating that I had to weed through crap to get to the ‘killer stories’.

The rating does not reflect the individual stories. When I was tracking my progress, I wrote down a little note on each story – these form the reviews below.

They are ranked in order:
1.Peter Robinson – People Just Don’t Listen – 5* - THAT IS HOW YOU DO IT! I read this one after a bad spell of continuous shit stories. This one short story restored my faith in this whole collection (and genre). I’ve always wanted to read Robinson; he’s the author of DCI Banks. That was so clever and written in 1 ½ pages.
2.Louise Welsh – Reflections in Unna – 4.5*: what the actual hell? She’s so clever. I’m going to research her.
3.Walter Mosley – The Sin of Dreams – 4.5*: so, so good. I loved the futuristic vibe and it made me question my morality; those are the best stories.
4.Stuart Neville – Juror 8 – 4.5*: rewriting this review for the complete review and I still remember the impact this short story had on me. This story had great potential for a whole book.
5.Ann Cleves – The Spinster – 4.5*: I’ve always wanted to read her. I like the Perez link; I’ve watched the BBC series. It was very clever and I really enjoyed the perspective.
6.Anthony Horowitz – Caught Short – 4*: the whole reason I started this book. I’m so happy this section is signed. The story is hilarious.
7.Martin Waites – Diagnosis: Murder – 4*- that was actually funny and smart. People just want an excuse…
8.Anne Zourdini – The Honey Trap – 4*: clever. Very clever.
9.Christopher Fowler- The Caterpillar Flag – 4*: a beautiful reality.
10.Neil Gaiman – The Case of Death and Honey – 3.5*: a very decent attempt at a Holmes adaptation. I’ve read worse. I have unrealistic expectations (as he’s my favourite literary character) and I need all of his stories to be perfect. Mycroft was funny and Johnlock was strong but I did miss John’s perspective and views of Holmes. The ending has messed me up a lot.
11.Maxim Jakubowski – My Life as a Killer – 3*: this actually made me laugh.
12.George Pelecanos – The Dead Their Eyes Implore Us – 3*: new and refreshing style to crime.
13.Mark Billingham – Underneath the Mistletoe Last Night – 2.5*: I usually hate this guy but I was pleasantly surprised. It’s not getting higher than 2.5*. The plot was way too obvious but it was nice for Christmas. Well nice for a murder…
14.Val McDermit – I’ve Seen That Movie – 2.5*: that was just odd.
15.Fred Vargas – Five Francs Each – 2.5*: a waste of my time.
16. Yrsa Sigurdardottir – Black Sky – 2*: I surprisingly sort of liked that. Bit disappointed with the potential of space.
17.Alexander McCall Smith – Trouble at the Institute for the Study of Forgiveness – 2*: ha, yeah, I get it. It was really disappointing but its McCall Smith so what do you expect really? Apart from uneventful and boring shenanigans.
18.John Connelly – The Children of Dr Lyall –2*: yeah it’s a ‘no’ from me.
19.Peter James – You’ll Never Forget My Face – 2*: the definition of ‘odd’. So strange!
20.Phil Rickman – The House of Susan Lullham – 2*: that was supposed to be supernatural but to me, it was just boring…
21.Simon Lewis – Buy and Bust - 2*: a disappointing police procedural. I’ll be staying away from this author.
22.Stella Duffy – Face Value – 2*: what even was that?
23.John Harvey – Not Tommy Johnson – 2* - what even was that? Yes, it was a crime but I definitely wouldn’t say it was exciting, never mind warrant a short story in a collection.
24.Denise Mina – The Calm Before – 1*: the only word to describe this was ‘meh’.
25.James Sallis – Venice is Sinking into the Sea – 1*: the plot was limited and obvious. Why did I waste my time reading this/
26.Adrian McKinty – The Ladder – 1*: all over a fucking game of squash. The main character was a pretentious arsehole and I just can’t deal with this story at al.
27.Ian Rankin – An Afternoon – 1*: I think I’m more pissed that he used something from 1983 and didn’t actually write something new for such a good cause.

I'm going to pleasure read throughout December because I need to relax and be ready for placement. I also have loads of uni work to do but I don't want to burn out over the Christmas holidays. I will try to relax.

Anyway, despite some of the dreadful reads, I love that I bought this book because I helped support a project by Oxfam and even though some of it was crap, it was all worth it for the ‘thank you for your support’.

Buy this book and even if you just flick to the good ones. Buy it because you’ll be helping a great cause and surely that makes it all worth it?

[Kate Potapenko · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had pretty high expectations, but this collection of stories turns out to be an absolute waste of time.
Majority of stories are more than boring, some of them don't make any sense at all and feel just like unfinished sketches.. kind of sketches that were too bad for anything but bin.

Couple of stories were okayish, but still not worth it...

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

OXCRIMES, from Profile books is a fundraising book of short crime stories with contributions from a strong group of authors - some of whom will be favourites, many of whom will be new to readers.

Said it before, will say it again, the best thing about short story collections is a chance to find "new to you" authors. In this collection the option of comparing them, up close, with more favourite writers is a bonus. Particularly as the list of contributors is so stellar, and the standard of the stories here really high.

For my money, I've had Stuart Neville on the "long list" for ages now, but have promoted him to "the ridiculously long List of Books that I have to read before I die", along with Anne Zouroudi. I've also bumped Mark Billingham, Denise Mina, Fred Vargas, Yrsa Sigurdardottir and John Harvey up on "the List" on the basis that I'm behind with their books. On the other hand, Adrian McKinty and Louise Welsh are on the top of "the List" as soon as there is a sniff of a new book (I've got a new one from McKinty here at the moment and I'm starting to develop a twitch whilst I do some "must be read" reading first). I'm also really pleased to see something from Stella Duffy - been a while.

But that's not to dismiss any of the other stories in OXCRIMES, and there's guaranteed to be something here for everyone. And it's for a good cause to boot.

http://www.austcrimefiction.org/revie...

[M Eve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lots of short crime stories by some amazing authors (Gaiman, Rankin, Fowler, Cleeves, McCall-Smith, etc. ). Short stories so that if one story is too grim/gory it is easy to skip ahead to the next story. This book got me through a stint in the hospital where 'short attention span' and distractions were issues. Would also be great if you're looking for something to read in ongoing waiting room waits as each story is about a 20-30 minute read.(found it in Raincoast Books).

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This chunky mystery anthology has something for everyone from a virtual who’s who of contemporary mystery writers including Val McDermid, Neil Gaiman, Peter Robinson, Ann Cleeves, Alexander McCall Smith, Ian Rankin, Walter Mosley, and others.

[Katheryn Thompson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the opportunity to read so many different short stories from so many different crime writers. I liked that the stories are short (some extremely short), because it meant that there was usually time to fit in a story while I was waiting for something, or to read one more before turning out the light. I also loved the variation, not just between the authors' voices but between the stories themselves. There's a story about Sherlock Holmes' later years, one about mining on the moon, another about an exorcism; one about an undercover police officer, one about a hit-and-run, and another about the migration of souls. Some are set in the past, some in the future. They evoke people and places from all over the world.

I rated each story as I read them, and they average out at 3/5. I gave one 5/5, to Adrian McKinty's 'The Ladder'. I also underlined the names of those authors I want to read more of: Neil Gaiman, Denise Mina, Adrian McKinty, Christopher Fowler, Ann Cleeves, and Yrsa Sigurdardóttir. I already have lots of the authors from this anthology on my to-read list (and I certainly haven't taken any off as a result of their short story), but I'm always looking for ways to prioritise my enormous TBR-pile.

I'd highly recommend this one if you're looking for a new author to try, or a way to choose what to read next, or simply if you want some variation in your crime reading.

[Kaila · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall, I wasn't very impressed with OxCrimes. But, the best thing about short story collections is the chance to find new authors, and OxCrimes certainly gave me that opportunity. Despite the fact that I found many of the stories to be boring, there were a few high quality stories which stood head and shoulders above the others, and so while I definitely did not enjoy this collection as a whole, I'm glad to have a few new authors to check out.

In order as they were given, ranging from pretty good to awesome:

Five Francs Each by Fred Vargas
Juror 8 by Stuart Neville
The Caterpillar Flag by Christopher Fowler
Reflections in Unna y Louise Welsh
The Honey Trap by Anne Zouroudi
The Spinster by Ann Cleeves
Trouble at the Institute for the Study of Forgiveness by Alexander McCall Smith*
Underneath the Mistletoe Last Night by Mark Billingham
Black Sky by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

There are a couple of others that people might also enjoy, such as The Sin of Dreams (Walter Mosley), so this isn't a bad collection to check out if you're trying to find new authors.

*I was surprised to quite like this one as I haven't particularly liked much else by this author. More light-hearted than many of the others, but good.

[Stephen Bacon · Rating 3 out of 5]

A charity anthology of 27 crime stories written by authors from around the globe (but mainly Britain), raising funds to benefit Oxfam, this is - given the array of talent onboard - a rather uneven collection of tales.
Some of the bigger names failed to deliver, which was a little disappointing, even if none of the stories are particularly awful. My favourites were by Christopher Fowler, George Pelecanos, Maxim Jakubowski, Ann Cleeves, Stuart Neville, Val McDermid, and Anne Zouroudi. In particular the Zouroudi and the Fowler stories alone are worth the price of the book. Recommended if you like crime shorts.

[MargCal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finished reading … OxCrimes / … 26 May 2017
ISBN: 9781781250648

OxCrimes is a collection of 27 short stories published as a fundraiser for Oxfam.
As with any collection, you're not going to like everything in it. Specific to this collection, different people like different things in their crimes and their crime writers. That said, I enjoyed the collection overall and am pleased to recommend it, especially given the “worthy cause” but worth it for its own sake too.

[Anna Lord · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some great names here. Many I had never read; a few I had never heard of; some I didn't care for... and then BANG! I read several stories twice they were soooo good. Horowitz (ho-hum) had me in stitches. LOL, as they say. Wide variety of plots, settings, writing styles says it all. Worth a go for sure... and all for charity. Even better.

[Kb · Rating 2 out of 5]

An eclectic collection of writing—not all of which can even be considered as coherent stories—by a surprising number of high-profile authors. Unfortunately, too many entries strayed into science fiction or, worse, the paranormal, when I was looking for crime and realism.

I can’t recommend this book except to the most omnivorous and tolerant of readers.

[Dale Parnell · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cracking collection of stories that has introduced me to quite a few authors I've never read before. Well worth a read.

[JoJo · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is nice to get a set of insights in to novelists you may not have read, and in this I found quite a few that I will go on to read more of.

[Rita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good collection of stories

[Sable · Rating 1 out of 5]

There were a couple of really great stories, but otherwise I was so disappointed

[Sara Habein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some good stories in this crime writing collection, only disliked a few.

[Darren]

Some stories are a little weird but got much better towards the end.

[Brian Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good selection of short stories. I enjoyed the Alexander McCall Smith entry: "Trouble at the Institute for the Study of Forgiveness"

[Chris Abraham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Five of the twenty seven were really good

[Leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

A high quality collection...

You only have to look at the cover of this book to see some of the huge names who have contributed stories to this anthology in aid of Oxfam. In total, there are twenty-seven stories, most of them original, and the overall quality is exceptionally high. There are a few that are really quite short, but most of them are pretty substantial and a few of them star the detective for whom the author is famous. As well as straightforward crime/detection, there are examples of both horror and sci-fi with a crime element, and black humour puts in more than one appearance.

In any anthology some stories are going to be stronger, or more to the reader’s taste, than others. There were only a couple of stories that I really didn’t enjoy, for my usual reasons – excessive and gratuitous language/violence etc – but the majority rated at 4 or 5 stars for me. So many of them were good that it’s hard to single any out, but some of the standouts for me were…

Yrsa Sigurdardottir’s Black Sky – We know Sigurdardottir can write crime and horror, but in this chilling story she shows that she can also write proper science-based sci-fi. A disturbingly possible scenario built on the idea that humanity has found a way to mine the moon for precious minerals. But what happens when a cry for help is heard coming from an abandoned base…?

Stuart Neville’s Juror 8 spins the story of Twelve Angry Men, showing not just what happens after the trial but also putting a different twist on the events inside the juryroom. Dark and imaginative, and told from the perspective of Emmet McArdle, the old man who was the first to give support to Juror 8.

Anne Zouroudi’s The Honey Trap tells the story of a long-ago child disappearance and how the truth is brought to light. Zouroudi builds great atmosphere in this story and her descriptive writing brings the Greek setting to life.

I could pick any of a dozen more, from a decent Sherlock Holmes pastiche by Neil Gaiman to a blackly funny and yet quite moving story from Mark Billingham in which Santa is murdered. Peter James gives us truly spooky horror in a tale of hags, curses and haunted figurines, while Anthony Horowitz makes us laugh and shudder in a deliciously horrible and blackly humorous story of cosmic justice. We have black widows, overly competitive squash players, migrated souls, stolen paintings…

To be honest, you’d need to be pretty much impossible to please if you didn’t enjoy at least some of these stories. Imaginative stories and great writing from top authors - the fact that it’s for a good cause is just an added bonus. Highly recommended.

www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Been dipping into this for months - it's good to have on your phone when there's a few minutes to kill (or maim, rob, or hatch evil plots against)

Mixed results, naturally. Only one or two stories were truly unpleasant. Many didn't linger long in my memory. Sometimes the perpetrator is more or less caught in the act; other times there's a kind of tension from knowing the story's in a crime collection and wondering when the crime's going to come along.

Most memorable for me were Anthony Horowitz's ad-man having a very bad day in Caught Short, the atmospheric The Caterpillar Flag, Juror 8's vengeance running beyond control and Mark Billingham's worst-ever Christmas story, beginning with a ho-ho-homicide and suffering from a distinct lack of peace and goodwill.

[Alastair Hudson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't often go for the Crime genre so almost all the authors here were new to me.
This collection was a pleasant surprise; though there were some writers here that were appalling.
The stand out for me was Neil Gaiman's Sherlock Tale. I've always loathed Gaiman's writing on the basis of the Sandman graphic novels (awful). But I take it all back; his short piece was brilliant and a fitting addition to the world of Sherlock. Other than that; the other authors I knew disappointed and some I didn't know were great. As an introduction to contemporary crime fiction I imagine this is pretty good and it made for fine bath time reading. Four stars thanks to Gaiman's tale.

[Kirsty · Rating 3 out of 5]

I purchased Ox Crimes whilst seeking out my Scorching Summer Reads pile because it sounded wonderful. I love the idea behind it; twenty seven crime writers donating a story apiece to Oxfam. As with the majority of anthologies, there were a few stories which didn't really interest me - the more hardboiled detective ones in this case - but on a high note, I have also (finally) discovered Stella Duffy.

I very much enjoyed how quirky a lot of these stories were; there were unusual elements to them for the most part, and not one could be termed run-of-the-mill. A mixed bag of crime stories, let's face it, but literature for a good cause is always worth buying.

[Tracey Acum · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good mix of different takes on the crime genre. Sometimes frustrating that so short, but intriguing. Those by authors I know and already love were not disappointing in most cases. Favourites were by Ann Cleeves, Mark Billingham, Maxim Jakubowski, Anne Zouroudi, Stuart Neville, Alexander McCall Smith, Fred Vargas and Martyn Waites. I was disappointed by the one by Anthony Horowitz. Some stories were unsettling and dissatisfying. Enjoyed this because it was something different, short stories to dip into.

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sold to benefit Oxfam and containing 27 stories from some of the best crime writers.My favourites were Caught Short (Anthony Horowitz)and Juror 8 (Stuart Neville). I also enjoyed The Case of Death and Honey (Neil Gaiman)although I read it somewhere before, as I did the Caterpillar Flag(Chris Fowler). There aren't any bad stories but You'll Never Forget My Face wasn't quite up to the rest, I thought, and The Caterpillar Flag was a bit weak for Chris Fowler.

[Louise Cadman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is really great and showcases all of the best crime writers in one book. The short stories vary in length and vary greatly in subject matter, but there isn't one story I didn't like. Out of 27 stories, to like every one is quite an achievement. I would greatly recommend this book, and the fact that a small percentage is donated to charity, just by buying and reading a great book, makes it so much easier to choose to buy this book.

[Gabi Coatsworth · Rating 4 out of 5]

The reason this took me so long to finish was because I read the short stories in between other books. A satisfying variety of excellent authors, although I think the quality was a bit variable. I expect that's unavoidable in a themed collection like this one. The proceeds went to support Oxfam, so I have no regrets about buying a copy (in London).

[Byju.V · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a collection of twenty seven crime stories by faous as well as not-so-famous writers. Do not expect the classical crime narrative here. Most of the stories deal with crime from the point of view of the perpetrator or the victim with minimum police inervention! You will like it. There is a foreword by ian Rankine.

[Rhonda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not usually a fan of short stories as they are over so quickly, but I enjoyed this selection of 27 crime stories from familiar authors. Some were very short indeed, but on to the next and next.

A line in Ian Rankin's Introduction reminds me why I read crime: "why do we humans beings continue to do bad things to each other?".