The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries

Big Book Series

By: Otto Penzler

Narrated by: Cat Gould, Matthew Lloyd Davies

Length: 32 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

Have yourself a crooked little Christmas with The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries. 

Edgar Award-winning editor Otto Penzler collects more than 50 of his all-time favorite holiday crime stories - many of which are difficult or nearly impossible to find anywhere else. From classic Victorian tales by Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Thomas Hardy, to contemporary stories by Sara Paretsky and Ed McBain, this collection touches on all aspects of the holiday season, and all types of mysteries. They are suspenseful, funny, frightening, and poignant. 

Included are puzzles by Mary Higgins Clark and Isaac Asimov; uncanny tales in the tradition of A Christmas Carol by Peter Lovesey and Max Allan Collins; O. Henry-like stories by Stanley Ellin and Joseph Shearing; comic gems from Donald E. Westlake and John Mortimer; and many, many more. Almost any kind of mystery you're in the mood for-suspense, pure detection, humor, cozy, private eye, or police procedural - can be found in this book.

©2013 Otto Penzler (introduction and compilation) (P)2020 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Excellent mix of stories

This is a great mix of contemporary and those short stories from the past! I recommend it for the holidays!

Perfect for Christmas

Delightful story selections including some authors I didn’t know. Narration was great.
Get a cup of cocoa and settle in.

All my favs!

all my faves. made me want to go back and read the authors again. Interesting!

Not Complete Book

Not all 100 stories that appear in the hard bound book are read in the Audible version. Including “Sister Bessie,” “A Christmas Tragedy”.

NOT UNABRIDGED

This is only a little over half of the stories in the printed Anthology - many of the titles/authors mentioned in the introduction are NOT included in the audiobook. Don't purchase this based on the sample provided either, the narration is very un-even (some readers are MUCH better than the others. Its the same with the audio quality.

Female Narrator Needs Breathing Lessons

I would have gladly given this book a full 5 star rating but for the female narrator s issue with the cadence of her breathing... it is most bizarre..
She stops in the middle of a word pushing out her breath,.. only to hurry along pell mell running the ending sentence into the start of the next one.
It was most disturbing,.. and I can’t fathom why no one caught the issue.

Not unabridged missing several stories

There are a handful of stories from this book not included on this audio production. The carol singers by Josephine bell (which is the story I was looking forward to hearing the most) is nowhere to be found. Even though it’s mentioned in the intro by penzler. Also the Agatha Christie story the Christmas pudding the very first story in the book is also nowhere to be found. As I went through the titles and tracks I found 3-4 other stories like the Santa Claus club is in the book not on here. What a shame. I was very excited for this release.

Enjoying it, but… these aren’t mysteries?

Exactly as the title says. These are not mysteries. Maybe I’m spoiled by Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, but it’s not like Doyle’s work is actually within the realm of the “mystery” genre either. I don’t mind a “police serial” where Sherlock lectures Watson (and us) about our stupidity and then proceeds to explain that he noticed a never-before-mentioned drop of maple syrup somewhere that apparently has to do with everything. That’s fine in its way. But these stories, the ones in this book, are not mysteries.

I am still enjoying the book! The stories are good, and the narrators are clearly talented. I would have retitled the book perhaps, as many of these stories have zero mystery at all about them, and could be better labeled as “Christmas oddities” or “incidents” or something. I especially liked the story about the butler coming home for Christmas, but a man finding a radio behind a box of decorations does not a mystery make.

Boring!

When I read a Christmas novel, I want it to hold my interest. None of this collection did that for me.

Disappointed

Some of the stories had foul language in them some of the stories are weren’t very good ,some of the narrators were irritating. I was totally expecting some light Christmas/ even humorous mysteries but got some depressing annoying stories .
Even from a author I liked.