Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 51, No. 9, September 2006

Editor’s Notes Notorious Stories by Linda Landrigan

As we’ve reminded you regularly, AHMM is fifty years old this year. As part of our celebration of our golden anniversary, we had invited readers to nominate their favorite stories and authors from throughout the magazine’s history. The response was enthusiastic, and I’m happy to report that many of your favorites are now included in our new anthology, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine Presents Fifty Years of Crime and Suspense, published by Pegasus Books.

This anthology reflects the diversity we strive to bring you in each issue of the magazine: historicals and procedurals, cozies and noirs, humor and suspense. It also documents a half century of great storytelling, with tales drawn from each decade of the magazine’s existence and featuring such writers as Jim Thompson, Donald E. Westlake, Ed McBain, Jan Burke, and Sara Paretsky. And finally, it celebrates our proud tradition of showcasing less familiar writers and cultivating new and up-and-coming talent, so you can also look for the likes of Henry Slesar, Jack Ritchie, and Steven Wasylyk; early stories by Doug Allyn, Rob Kantner, and Martin Limón; and tales by such vigorous mid-career writers as I. J. Parker and Rhys Bowen.

Speaking of reader favorites, we are delighted to welcome back to our pages this month Walter Satterthwait and William Link, both returned after long absences. We have no new authors to introduce this month, but Kevin Prufer is making his second appearance in AHMM, and those of you who wrote in to tell us you enjoyed his first story (“The Body in the Spring,” June 2005) will surely enjoy “The River Market Murders” as well. Meanwhile, O’Neil De Noux’s atmospheric tale, “The Heart Has Reasons,” readily suggested our striking cover. And we welcome back also Susan Oleksiw, Jas. R. Petrin, and Bill Crenshaw, whose Fish Award — winning May 1984 story, “Poor Dumb Mouths,” is our Mystery Classic this month.

Editor’s