Two of the Deadliest: New Tales of Lust, Greed, and Murder from Outstanding Women of Mystery

Two of the Deadliest: New Tales of Lust, Greed, and Murder from Outstanding Women of Mystery is the second Sisters in Crime / Elizabeth George anthology, following the broader-scope A Moment on the Edge. This one narrows the brief: each contributor was asked for an original story turning on lust or greed, two of the seven deadlies most useful for short crime fiction. The lineup includes Marcia Muller, Patricia Smiley, Carolyn Wheat, Nancy Pickard, and Laurie King, among others.

The collection’s best stories tend to be the ones that take the constraint seriously instead of treating it as a sticker. Carolyn Wheat’s piece is a small mean classic about marital greed dressed as inheritance law. Marcia Muller’s Sharon McCone short reads like a five-act novel compressed to thirty pages. There are weak spots (one or two stories lean on the prompt rather than building character), but the average quality is unusually high for a themed crime anthology. George’s introductory framing puts the historical lineage between this volume and A Moment on the Edge to good use.

Recommended for fans of women crime writers in the literary-suspense tradition, anyone teaching short crime fiction, and readers looking for books like Sue Grafton’s Kinsey and Me or Marcia Muller’s short fiction with a broader bench. Solid four stars, and a worthwhile companion to A Moment on the Edge.