The big book of rogues and villains

Review by New York Times Review

THE BIG BOOK OF ROGUES AND VILLAINS Edited by Otto Penzler (Vintage Crime, $25.) Penzler takes what is arguably the best part of crime and mystery novels - the villains - and packs them into an encyclopedic anthology that manages to cover both Dracula and Dr. Fu Manchu. To be read through a monocle and with a sinister sneer. THE SECRET LIVES OF COLOR By Kassia St. Clair (Penguin, $20.) Chrome Yellow, Dragon's Blood and Pitch Black. These are just three of the 75 shades, dyes and hues St. Clair explores as she tells the backstory of the colors that make up our world. WHY WE DON'T SUCK By Dr. Denis Leary (Crown Archetype, $27.) Leary, the actor and co-creator of the FX series "Rescue Me" (and doctor by honorary degree), takes "equal opportunity aim" at the most partisan issues of our political moment with a mission to #MakeAmericaLaughAgain. PIE & WHISKEY (Sasquatch Books, $19.95.) This project began as a reading series organized by Lebo and Ligon, in which they sent 12 writers a pie and whiskey prompt to inspire new work. Six years later, they have created an anthology that's just as eclectic, drunk and delicious. THE UNQUOTABLE TRUMP By R. Sikoryak (Drawn and Quarterly, $19.95.) Sikoryak, an artist known for his arch comic adaptations of literary classics, casts President Trump, along with his outlandish claims and alternative facts, as some of the most notable villains in comic book history. Wonder Woman is now "Nasty Woman" and the Black Panther series is reimagined as "The Black Voter." Noteworthy Last summer, I happened to meet two authors whose books sent me into a World War II reading binge. Lynne Olson's "LAST HOPE ISLAND" chronicles the story of the Poles, French, Dutch and other Europeans who took refuge in Britain and fought to liberate their homelands from there. This was a discovery and led me to her previous books, including "CITIZENS OF LONDON" and "THE MURROW BOYS," the latter written with her husband, Stanley Cloud, and both remarkable accounts of Americans in the wartime British capital. I also loved "THE JERSEY BROTHERS," by Sally Mott Freeman, about three brothers in the Navy. The oldest was on the USS Enterprise carrier in the Pacific. The middle one, Freeman's father, set up Franklin D. Roosevelt's Map Room to track the war. The youngest was captured by the Japanese and the book is the story of the search for this brother, missing in action. So powerful, so richly researched. - PETER BAKER, CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, ON WHAT HE'S READING NOW.

Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [July 16, 2018]

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Review by Booklist Review

Veteran anthologist Penzler's survey of rogues and villains in crime fiction is structured chronologically, with sections covering the Victorians, nineteenth-century Americans, Edwardians, early twentieth-century Americans, Between the Wars, the pulp era, and the moderns. There are plenty of familiar faces, including Robert Louis Stevenson (The Body-Snatcher), Bram Stoker (Dracula's Guest), Richard Connell (The Most Dangerous Game), Maurice Leblanc (The Mysterious Railway Passenger), Loren D. Estleman (The Black Spot), and Donald E. Westlake (Too Many Crooks, a Dortmunder story). There is, Penzler tells us, a difference between rogues and villains rogues are thieves, swindlers, blackmailers, and forgers, while villains are murderers and psychopaths and the stories bear this distinction out, with the tales of roguery being generally lighter in tone than the villainous pieces. This anthology is a delight for crime-fiction fans; it's a chance to revisit some old favorites and to discover some new ones, like Bertram Atkey, creator of the likable crook Smiler Bunn, and George Fielding Eliot, a writer of military fiction and nonfiction who dabbled, quite successfully, in pulp fiction.--Pitt, David Copyright 2017 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Edgar-winner Penzler's entertaining and wide-ranging seventh Big Book (after 2016's The Big Book of Jack the Ripper) offers 72 stories featuring out-and-out bad guys, such as Bram Stoker's Dracula, and others whose morality is more ambiguous, such as Leslie Charteris's the Saint. In addition to the many expected names (Donald Westlake, Edgar Wallace, Cornell Woolrich), Penzler resurrects such now-obscure writers as Everett Rhodes Castle, May Edginton, and George Randolph Chester. Chester weighs in with perhaps the most intriguing title, "The Universal Covered Carpet Tack Company," which centers on a clever and elaborate stock swindle. Bertram Atkey's gifted pickpocket "Smiler" Bunn demonstrates his "celebrated imitation of a gentleman pinching a blood-orange" at the start of "The Adventure of 'The Brain.'" Like many entries, this tale boasts a killer opening line. Another example is H.G. Wells's "The Hammerpond Park Burglary" ("It is a moot point whether burglary is to be considered as a sport, a trade, or an art"). The fruits of Penzler's decades of diligent study of the genre pay off handsomely in this fat volume. Agent: Nat Sobel, Sobel Weber. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

Black Lizard's latest plus-size anthology, reprinting 72 stories, practically all of them published in the U.S. and U.K. over the past two centuries, is a monument to bad behavior.With obvious exceptions like Hannibal Lecter and Count Dracula, fictional criminals have rarely attracted the same attention as fictional detectives because they've rarely had the same staying power. Even so, veteran anthologist Penzler (Bibliomysteries, 2017, etc.) has assembled a lineup of franchise luminaries likely to quicken the pulse of many a genre fan: Grant Allen's Colonel Clay, E.W. Hornung's A.J. Raffles, Thomas W. Hanshew's Hamilton Cleek, Maurice Leblanc's Arsne Lupin, Clifford Ashdown's Romney Pringle, K. and Hesketh Prichard's Don Q, Sax Rohmer's Dr. Fu Manchu, Frederick Irving Anderson's The Infallible Godahl and Sophie Lang, O. Henry's Jeff Peters and Andy Tucker, Jack Boyle's Boston Blackie, Gerald Kersh's Karmesian, Edgar Wallace's Four Square Jane, Leslie Charteris' Simon Templar, Erle Stanley Gardner's Ed Jenkins, Lester Leith, Paul Pry, and the Patent Leather Kid, Edward D. Hoch's Nick Velvet, Robert L. Fish's Kek Huuygens, Lawrence Block's Bernie Rhodenbarr, Martin Ehrengraf, and John Keller, Max Allan Collins' Quarry, Donald E. Westlake's Dortmunder, and of course Dracula. The most notable omission, mentioned in Penzler's brief Introduction but unaccountably absent from the table of contents, is Melville Davisson Post's crooked lawyer, Randolph Mason. Although these franchise entries are naturally of varying quality, many of them mark their villains' (or their rogues'Penzler's conscientious attempt to categorize every single one of these nefarious leads as either one or the other or both seems a pointless exercise) first appearances, giving this collection an added historical interest. Newcomers may want to begin with the most celebrated nonfranchise tales: Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Body Snatcher," Richard Connell's "The Most Dangerous Game," Thomas Burke's "The Hands of Mr. Ottermole," Ben Hecht's "The Fifteen Murderers," and William Irish's "After-Dinner Story." Old hands may note that bad guys can make just as big a splash in a short story as in a long one: the lengthiest item here, Donald E. Keyhoe's pulp novella The Mystery of the Golden Skull, packs no greater punch than the oldest story of all, one of the shortest, and one of the most shockingly unexpected from its source, Washington Irving's "The Story of a Young Robber." Weighing in at a svelte 928 pages, Penzler's omnibus is equally impossible to pick up and put down. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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INTRODUCTION             Mystery fiction encompasses a broad spectrum of sub-genres, although it is common for casual aficionados to focus on the detective story as the only "true" mystery. As I have often defined it, and, quite naturally, I regard it as a good and fair definition, a mystery is any work of prose fiction in which a crime or the threat of a crime is central to the theme or plot.             On a football field, the pure detective story may go from the end zone to the twenty-five yard line. The crime story, in which the central figure is a criminal of some kind, whether rogue or villain (and I'll get to that shortly), may move the ball another twenty yards. The novel of suspense, which includes women or children in jeopardy, the everyday gone wrong, as well as tales of psychological unease and irrational behavior, whether of sociopathy or fear, will produce a long gain well past midfield, and espionage/international intrigue, will cross the goal-line. The killing of a large number of people is, of course, part of the same horrific game as the killing of an individual.             There are numerous sub-sub genres (historical mysteries, police procedurals, comedies, etc.) but they fall within the prime sub-genres, many of which also overlap: all forms may (one might say should ) create suspense, spies may work as detectives to catch moles, psychopaths tend to be criminals, and their actions may well create suspense and a detective is probably hunting them, so the lines blur.             The preponderance of anthologies published in the nearly century-and-a-quarter since the first legitimate mystery anthology, the anonymously edited The Long Arm and Other Detective Tales was released in 1895, have featured detectives as the central characters. This collection has reversed that common practice to focus on criminals. The title, The Big Book of Rogues and Villains , very specifically divides the protagonists into two groups, mostly quite different from each other, although those lines also blur from time to time.             Roguery must be distinguished from villainy. The latter is the creature of evil and malice, if not of outright pathology. It is bad behavior carried to an unpleasant extreme--generally murder. The former tends not to be vicious, prefers no serious physical injury to others, and defines itself as rascality soaked in humor or explained as the result of an unfortunate social environment. Again, the lines may blur from time to time, as a rogue may cause severe hardship or fear in others, while the villain may have a tender heart for a dog or a child, even if he has murdered someone.             While we may normally be easily able to perceive the distinction between roguery and villainy, the contrast may hinge less upon the venality or atrocity of the deed perpetrated than upon the character's and the author's point of view.             The typical crime of the rogue is theft, whether by burglary, swindling, forgery, blackmail, or other physically non-violent transgressions. If his escapades lead to serious physical violence, that action will generally end his career as a rascal and places him into the category of villain. Most rogues prefer to win by guile or dexterity that which others have earned by labor or inherited. He may create a phony business with worthless stock, forge a will or a check, cheat at cards, scheme for marriage to an heiress, crack a safe in the dark of night, or replace a genuine Old Master with a fake. History and literature have shown there is no end to the nefarious schemes of which the amoral mind is incapable of devising.             The typical crime of the villain is murder, for which there is seldom an acceptable excuse. Although one of the protagonists in this book excuses his action by saying, "He needed killing," not everyone would agree. Still, there are myriad reasons that not only excuse killing but applaud it. Not all killing, it may be said, is murder. Self-defense is the easiest to justify, and there are two sides vehemently opposed to other examples of taking a human life. The most frequently posited is: "Given the chance to go back in time, would you kill (pick your real villain--Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Idi Amin--it's a long list) given the opportunity?" And would it make you a villain if you did?             I'm in danger of asking next how many angels could dance around the head of a pin, while this large gathering of fictional rogues and villains is designed merely to give pleasure. It's a giant shelf-filler of what was once known as escapist fiction before the term fell into disfavor. Is any fiction not escapist?             It is thoughtfully but impossibly divided into sections, though as I compiled the Table of Contents I realized that there are many stories that easily could fall into more than one category, so please don't take the divisions too seriously.             The heyday of the gentleman thief was the end of the Victorian era and the Edwardian era, and many of the stories have a similarity that's hard to avoid with a book of this kind. The crooks often have good standing in the community and they dress well. It's a game to them, even if a dangerous one, and they carry off their roles with insouciance and verve. Many of them are brilliant and have nerves of steel. They are seemingly infallible, rarely getting caught but, if they do, they always find a way out through their wit, a bogus alibi, or a flummoxed witness.             As a grammatical aside, I've been using the pronoun "he" because "they" is just flat-out wrong and "he or she" is cumbersome, so no offense to anybody. But women have their roles here, too, and you will undoubtedly find them as charming as their "gangs" do. You will find Fidelity Dove and Four Square Jane very similar, but there was never a thought of omitting either. Almost all the female rogues (and villains) are young and beautiful--all the better to fool their victims as well as the police.             Other similarities of style and performance occur in the stories about the morally-challenged lawyers Randolph Mason and Ehrengraf, the adventures of hit men Quarry and Keller, the modus operandi of con men Wallingford and Colonel Clay, the conscienceless actions of "Yellow Peril" monsters Quong Lung and Fu Manchu, and the rogues of Erle Stanley Gardner. Then again, there are not many differences between the methods of such iconic detectives as Philip Marlowe, Sam Spade, and Lew Archer. What matters is how creatively and beautifully the authors tell the stories.             The genre has its rules and restrictions, just as symphonies and sonnets have theirs. One raspberry has its similarities to another, but the point is not to seek a major variation, merely to enjoy it. I hope you enjoy these stories and their variations.             And remember: Crime may pay in fiction but it's not a good choice in real life. Sherlock Holmes is still alive and will catch you! -- Otto Penzler Excerpted from The Big Book of Rogues and Villains All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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