Carolyn Walsh 's Reviews > The Perfect Crime

** spoiler alert ** This is an outstanding short story collection edited by Vaseem Khan and Maxim Jakubowski. The high-quality stories of crime, murder, mayhem, mystery, horror, dark humour and revenge represent stories from various ethnic, cultural, and minority groups with locations at home and abroad. These uniformly entertaining alarming, puzzling and compelling stories represent diverse backgrounds, ethnicities, cultures, and settings from around the world. Some authors have already found great success in the crime fiction market. They include Black, Hispanic, Asian, and Indigenous authors from several continents.

The editors mention in their introduction that crime and mystery stories only a few decades ago were essentially by white authors, and their readership was the same. Some White authors began setting their mysteries in cultural settings with popular success featuring Black, Asian, Indigenous, and Latin protagonists. For instance, there was Bony Bonaparte, an Aboriginal detective, Inspector Ganesh Ghote of the Bombay police, Black American detective Virgil Tibbs, and the symbol of black power, Shaft, which were all written by white authors. Tony Hillerman set his stories in Indian reservations. Today they may seem to be examples of cultural appropriation, but their popularity paved the way for a new generation of diverse mystery writers and their readers to enjoy stories that immersed them in tales from different cultural and ethnic backgrounds and countries.

Vaseem Khan, an author I always enjoy, mentions that when he started writing, he believed his stories had to feature white characters prominently, but he now has two very popular series set in India with Indian proponents.

This anthology features 22 short stories that represent diversity in race, culture, and location. Many of the authors may already be known to mystery/crime fans. Some may not be familiar to readers, but the quality and entertainment value of their stories included in the volume make their books worth seeking out.
One of the short stories was by a writer new to me this year, Abir Mukherjee. He has a stellar series of mysteries set in India near the end of British occupation and rule. I read the entire series in quick succession, and they will be high on my favourite list for 2022. This anthology has caused me to seek out novels by some unfamiliar writers I might have missed.

It is almost impossible to list favourite stories in this book, they are all so good. Among my personal favourites are the Mayor of Duke City- S. A. Cosby.
Land of Milk and Honey-Silvia Moreno Garcia
Sundown-Sheena Kamal
For Marge-J. P. Pomare
Jumping Ship-Oyinkan Braithwaite
The Beautiful Game-Sandjia Kay
Gnomes Mans Land-Felicia Yap
Death in Darjeeling-Vaseem Khan

This is an important collection of high-quality and compelling stories of various styles, diverse characters and settings and will introduce readers to new authors to seek out, follow, and enjoy.