The Best American Mystery Series are all excellent collections of Mysteries in the short story form.. a difficult art form where each sentence, each plot line has to be close to perfect or it stands out like Wall Street financiers in a soup line. Each year has a different working editor who winnows down the list of nominees to the twenty or so who make the cut.. in 2003, the editor is Michael Connelly. Each year may have one or at the most two stories that are simply not quite as excellent as the rest.. a matter of preference. Among this years authors are the well knowns such as James Crumley, Elmore Leonard and Scott Phillips as well as relative lesser lights who are still capable of minor masterpieces in this demanding craft. ( )

This set of short story mysteries is better described as a collection of crime short stories. There was very little mystery involved. There's a good collection of hard-core and less cozy of the genre. At times, I felt as though I was reading more pornography than mystery (see Sockdolager by Scott Phillips) without any mystery involvement. There are two good stories of mention Richard's Children by Brendan DuBois, a mystery involving the conspiracy theories behind JFK and RFK's murders linked to Richard the 3rd of England's murderous notoriety and War Can Be Murder by Mike Doogan, a short story involving Dashiell Hammett's time in the US army in Alaska during WWII. Two of the stories can be considered "good", one fair and the other poor. This certainly can't be the "Best Mystery Shorts"! ( )