Ellery Queen's Japanese Golden Dozen: The Detective Story World in Japan

"As an anthologist, Ellery Queen is without peer, his taste unequalled. As a bibliographer and a collector of the detective short story, Queen is, again, a historical personage. Indeed, Ellery Queen clearly is, after Poe, the most important American in mystery fiction." -- Otto Penzler, from Detectionary: A Biographical Dictionary of Leading Characters in Mystery FictionA newspaper receives a letter from a man claiming to have been murdered--it's impossible but the truth is not so simple; five strangers who share the same initials are invited to spend the night in a luxury hotel but one of them is a murderer.The 12 stories in this book will lead you through dramatic twists and unexpected turns. The legendary Ellery Queen selected these stories by award-winning Japanese authors from among many thousands published in postwar Japan. Each story features an unusual crime and a complex set of clues investigated by a diverse and colorful cast of characters that includes a calculating inspector, a tenacious journalist, and a determined scientist.The thrilling stories in this volume include:Ellery Queen's Japanese Mystery Stories is a collection that is sure to delight lovers of great detective and crime fiction. The book features a new foreword by Japanese detective fiction expert Satoru Saito which places the stories within the context of Japanese society and modern Japanese literature.