Cutting Edge: New Stories of Mystery and Crime by Women Writers [Paperback]

Fifteen stories (and six ditties by Margaret Atwood) that view the conventions of noir fiction through female eyes. The most surprising aspect, given all the writers are women, is that the victims of crime/betrayal/despair are as likely to be shes as hes. Drowning, stabbing, shooting, beheading: the fun is endless. But of course, in the end, it isnt the themes or the innovations on the format of the short story anthology that make the tales collected in? Is there a distinctive female noir? asks Oates in her introduction. This collection may not settle that question, but it goes a long way toward supplying candidates for an emerging canon. There are 15 stories here, all but one of them new, and half a dozen new poems . . . the average [story] is high enough to satisfy readers of all genders. The indefatigable Joyce Carol Oates gathers a strong list of names for? This collection enlivens . . . flattened archetypes by retelling the noir narrative from the new perspectives of teenage girls, women hired hands, and mothers of children.