Trace the hard-boiled mystery back to its roots with this collection of twenty-eight detective stories set in tough, urban settings. From classics by Poe and Vidocq to contemporary favorites such as Hammett and Spillane, this is a literary feast for all mystery fans.

Introduction / David Willis McCullough --
The simple art of murder / Raymond Chandler --
The clue of the yellow curtains / Francois Eugene Vidocq --
The mystery of Marie Roget / Edgar Allen Poe --
The lodger / Marie Belloc Lowndes --
Princess Sonia's bath / Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre --
The investors / Edgar Wallace --
The tenth clew / Dashiell Hammett --
The rubber trumpet / Roy Vickers --
No proof / Yoh Sano --
Dead-end for Delia / William Campbell Gault --
At the Etoile du Nord / Georges Simenon --
I always get the cuties / John D. MacDonald --
This world, then the fireworks / Jim Thompson --
The gold fever tapes / Mickey Spillane --
Wild goose chase / Ross MacDonald --
The nine-to-five man / Stanley Ellin --
Small homocide / Ed McBain --
Blind man with a pistol / Chester Himes --
Pigeon blood / Paul Cain --
Just one of those days / Donald E. Westlake --
Election day / Joseph Hansen --
The Parker shotgun / Sue Grafton --
The Johore murders / Paul Theroux --
Sure, blue, and dead, too / Janwillem van de Wetering --
Skin deep / Sara Paretsky --
Death by water / William Marshall --
Flake piece / Carolyn Wheat --
Dead soldier / Loren D. Estleman --
Double indemnity, the screenplay / Raymond Chandler and Billy Wilder