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Title: Death-Mate
Series: ----------
Author: Alfred Hitchcock (Editor)
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Crime Fiction
Pages: 161
Words: 63K

Synopsis:

From the Inside Cover:

Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag AND BURY IT! Especially if your troubles consist of somebody you don’t particularly like. That’s the sort of advice that makes Alfred Hitchcock smile, smile, smile—and he’s horribly happy to survey the dreadfully delightful results. Currently Alfie is overjoyed to be able to report that every day in every way victims are dying better and better—and murder has never been more masterful, and fiendish fun more free-wheeling, than in this brand new collection of terror tales by fourteen of the most cheerfully chilling writers you would never want to meet in the dark.

A collection of short stories consisting of:

Introduction by Alfred Hitchcock

The Human Fly by Syd Hoff

Two Bits’ Worth of Luck by Fletcher Flora (A Novelette)

An Honest Man by Elijah Ellis

An interrogation by Talmage Powell

Choice of Weapon by C. B. Gilford

Mr. D. and Death by Henry Slesar

Others Deal in Death by August Derleth

A Steal at the Price by James Holding

The Waiting Room by Charles W. Runyon

Everybody Should Have a Hobby by Theodore Mathieson

Beiner and Wife by Michael Brett

Select Bait by Richard O. Lewis

Punch Any Number by Jack Ritchie (A Novelette)

White Lie, or Black? by Hal Ellson

My Thoughts:

With this many stories, the variety was wide, and that was a good thing. Being crime fiction, it ran from good guys getting the badguys, to badguys getting away, to badguys killing goodguys to badguys killing other badguys to badguys just being badguys. It was quite the potluck of stories with something for everyone, most likely.

With this being an Alfred Hitchcock collection (he was a big editor back in the day and put his name on a LOT of books) things aren't just normal twisted. Some of these are just downright creepy and twisted.

I think the best example of that was the story Everybody Should Have a Hobby. A retired man works with juvenile delinquents to help get them back into society. One boy is a real hardcase with arson under his belt but the man gets him interested in cooking. The story ends with the boy destroying the man's kitchen, killing the man and realizing that his “new” hobby is to become a serial killer. Yeah, down right twisted.

I've currently got 10 of these collections from the 50's to the 70's and I am hoping that a collection of short stories will keep things fresh for each book.

★★★☆☆ ( )