I had only read a couple of these authors and I am always on the lookout for new books to read so this was a great way of trialing them out. The unique idea of blending characters from different authors together in multiple short stories was intriguing and worked really well. None of the tales felt awkwardly written. Each story was different and engrossing - the only sad thing is that they are short stories and I often wondered what would happen next! Highly recommended - especially if you've read at least one of the authors and want to see one of the characters in a completely different scenario.

In this very different short story writing, we have a pairing up of twenty-two mystery writers of today as they tell a short story tale of intrigue, mystery, and thrillers. In each tale two authors, one male and one female, are paired and each puts their spin on a story ofttimes involving the characters for which they are known for. Mr Child provides an intro to each story and sets up the reader for the how and why of the pairings, many times providing for the reader, an introduction to the authors for those who are not familiar with their work.

This concept was different and did provide an interesting read for those who do like the short story way of writing, especially those in the thriller realm. However, in many cases, the writing did seem a bit rushed and although I did not know all the authors in this anthology, the ones I did know were not up to their usual standards.

This one was ok. I though that I would enjoy it more, since it's a mash up. Turns out that I like each author separately.(Amazon reviewed).

This anthology of short stories co-written by some of our best mystery/thriller authors was so much fun to read. I did skip one story that didn't interest me, but I raced through all the others. It must have been a challenge for each author have his/her lead character interact with another author's, but they did a fabulous job of it. My favorite was Karin Slaughter/Michael Koryta, but I enjoyed them all.

In the sequel to Face Off male and female authors are paired up to bring their most famous thrill stars together in stories unique to this collection. a variety of poplar authors are paired up in an effort to create a collection of thrilling stories.
I usually enjoy short story collections and enjoy finding new authors to read. This isn't one of my favorites. I did really enjoy the first and last story in the collection and have found one new author to check out but the rest of the book was lackluster and that is sad considering I like many f=of the authors included.
The majority of stories just seemed too forced. What must of have been a fun challenge to authors is a laborious mishmash of characters that would never cross and forced plots. Very few characters paired up harmoniously leaving me struggling through short story after short story.
It is interesting that they make a big deal about pairing the genders. In Facebook male and female writers had worked together. The book only pars authors of the opposite gender; it doesn't mean that the match up in the stories are men and women working together.
I was really disappointed in this collection.

I have to start by saying that I am typically not a fan of short stories BUT I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I am looking forward to reading more by these authors and delving into their popular series. I love the concept of pairing authors' characters into a story. I miss some of these characters (Hello Charlaine Harris!!) and was so happy to read even a snippet of their story line. This is a great way to sample well-known authors without investing in a full book. Thanks for whetting my appetite!

Review appeared at ReviewingtheEvidence.com:

Twenty-two thriller writers have paired up to write eleven short stories for the latest anthology by the International Thriller Writers (ITW). But this anthology, edited by Lee Child, comes with a twist—each story is written by one female and one male writer.

The male/female author pairings are more of a gimmick, and it's really the pairing of their characters that make these short stories interesting. In the real world, or even the world of fiction, many of these characters would never have met. This adds an extra challenge for some of the writing pairs—and makes it fun for readers who know these characters.

For example, in "Past Prologue," by Diana Gabaldon and Steve Berry, Berry's Cotton Malone has to go back in time to interact with some of Gabaldon's creations from her hugely successful time-traveling Outlander series. In this short story, Cotton, a retired covert agent-turned-bookshop owner, travels to Scotland for a rare book auction, taking an unintended trip into the 1700s.

Other improbable pairings show up. In "Faking a Murderer," Kathy Reich's Temperance Brennan and Lee Child's Jack Reacher don't seem like they would have gotten along—even if they did meet. But Reacher, passing through the Washington, DC area, comes to Brennan's aid when she is suspected in a murder. Once you read this short story, the partnership makes perfect sense.

Charlaine Harris, who has authored several series (including the popular Sookie Stackhouse and Aurora Teagarden) teams up with Andrew Gross, who wrote for James Patterson and now writes what he calls "suburban thrillers." Gross' Ty Hauck, a hardened former Connecticut detective, teams up with Harris' Harper Connelly, a young woman who can locate dead bodies and visualize their last moments. In "Dig Here," they travel to Alexandria, Egypt, investigating the disappearance of a young woman.

An even stronger paranormal story comes from Lara Adrian and Christopher Rice. Adrian's Lucan Thorne, a vampire, pairs up with Rice's Lilliane Williams, another immortal supernatural, in "Midnight Flame," which is set in New Orleans. There's a fun nod to Anne Rice, Christopher's mother, in the story.

Two powerhouse thriller writers, Lisa Scottoline and Nelson DeMille, team up in "Getaway." Scottoline's Bennie Rosato and DeMille's John Corey both end up, alone, in neighboring lake cabins in the Adirondacks. When Rosato runs into suspicious goings-on in the woods, Corey is the only person she can turn to.

Other thriller writers in the anthology included Sandra Brown, C.J. Brown, Val McDermid, Peter James, Gayle Lynds, David Morrell, Karin Slaughter, Michael Koryta, Lisa Jackson, John Sandford, J.A. Jance, and Eric Van Lustbader.

Those who are familiar with the characters will enjoy watching them interact with other fictional worlds, while introductions to unfamiliar characters may give readers a taste for more. It's another strong anthology from ITW.

§ Lourdes Venard is an independent editor who divides her time between New York and Maui.

I was intrigued by the pairings of female authors with male, each bringing a favorite character into the mix. I think overall, this worked out brilliantly.

Some of my favorite stories were pairings of Temperance Brennan and Jack Reacher (Reichs and Child), Regan Pescoli and Virgil Flowers (Lisa Jackson and Sanford), and the paranormal teaming of Lucan Thorne and Lilliane (Lara Adrian and Christopher Rice).

I also appreciated that each story was introduced by a short explanation of how the writers paired up and wrote the story, and how they chose which characters to use.

I didn't love every story, but there were enough that I did to make this book a must-read. It even introduced me to a few authors that I plan to check out further.

Most anthologies like this, I only read the stories by my favorite authors and skip the rest. With this one, I decided to give it a shot and read all of them. I am quite glad that I did. While I did enjoy the stories with characters I knew a bit more than the ones with characters new to me, I think every story was quite well written. I loved seeing the challenges the authors had of making their disparate characters mesh. I'll be watching for more from this series for sure and maybe checking out a few more authors after reading these tales.

Another chance to read short stories where authors have taken their detectives and allowed them to work together. (see FaceOff). It really is a pleasure to see old friend characters and meet new ones. Sure there are some you can skip over - your choice. But in general this is a wonderful opportunity to see some of your reliable detectives work together in a short story. If you're not happy - it ends soon! Perfect to recommend to the mystery readers that complain their authors aren't writing fast enough!! Give them this and they will be ready to try new authors painlessly.

I loved "Face Off" and the idea for the series. However, there wasn't one story in this book that I liked. There were a couple with good starts, but they all fizzled out. It was like the authors didn't want to waste a good plot line. The only reason I gave it two stars is that it introduced me to some authors that I was not familiar with and I ordered their books.

*Thanks to NetGalley for a digital copy of this book!*

I really enjoyed this book. I'm not generally a fan of short stories, but these are well developed plots. The stories are all very different, but all of them were enjoyable. I know, or at least recognize, most of the characters. I enjoyed the interaction between them, often humorous and/or competitive. In many, very different genres and characters were blended and it was interesting to see the dynamics of plot and character. I really liked Lee Child's introduction to each story. It's interesting to see how each duo chose to work together and engage their characters. I plan to go back and read FaceOff now. This also gave me an introduction to the authors I have not read, and their characters, and I'll be expanding my reading list now!

MatchUp is an anthology of short stories by crime novel writers, most of whom you have probably already read. This one is edited by Lee Child, and it is the next such analogy put out by the International Thriller Writers. The first was called Thriller and was edited by James Patterson in 2006. In 2009, Clive Cussler edited Thriller 2. Sandra Brown did Love is Murder in 2012. And in 2014, Face Off and was edited by David Baldacci. These are all major heavyweights in the crime genre.

The twist to MatchUp is that men and women writers have been paired together. The challenge the authors took on was to combine their own primary protagonists that they’ve already written about and to include them in the same story. Sandra Brown wrote Honor &… with C.J. Box. Kathy Reiches wrote Faking a Murderer with Lee Child. Lisa Jackson wrote Deserves to be Dead with John Sandford. Lisa Scottoline wrote Getaway with Nelson DeMiller. And there’s so much more. If you love short stories and crime novels, this one will get you through those moments when you’re not quite ready to take on a whole novel. You can’t go wrong by keeping this one at your bedside.

This suspenseful book of short stories came right when I was needing a Reacher fix. I enjoyed the concept of matching up two male/female characters of some of my favorite authors in new settings and stories. The introduction of how the stories were co-authored were fascinating. A couple of the stories bombed, but many were enjoyable and action packed. Highly recommended!

Short stories by the thriller authors you love and some you may not know. Most of the stories are great, such good match ups with characters from each of the authors series. They give you a different perspective on the characters. A few I found hard to get through, but most of them were highly entertaining!

MatchUp from Lee Child is essentially a bunch of different short story combining characters from different books into the same worlds. It’s a kind of fanfiction wonderland to bring characters from vastly different realities and circumstances and see them in an entirely new light. So I get why this is awesome in theory. It just wasn’t really awesome for me. I think if perhaps I would have been a fan of more of the characters and their respective series’ I may have been more inclined to enjoy the novel.

The one story I did have interest in was Midnight Flame by Lara Adrian and Christopher Rice. It was a fun little adventure about Lucan from the Midnight Breed Series (which I love) meeting Lilliane from the Desire Exchange series (which I’ve been wanting to try for a while) and I liked their buddy cop kind of story. I’m not sure if I believe that both of these worlds should exist in the same universe however, but I suppose they could. I mean the Midnight Breed series is about alien vampires… so anything could happen! I liked that I finally got a little taste of the Desire Exchange series and I’m definitely more intrigued by that world and characters.

I wish I was able to really get into the other stories but something was holding me back. Perhaps it’s because I wasn’t really familiar with any of the other characters going in and therefore wasn’t able to connect with them in such a short story. However, I did like Midnight Flame so at least I got something out of this. It doesn't feel right to rate this with a low star rating because it's not the author's faults that I didn't connect to the stories so I'm just not going to give this a star rating at all.

Other than Guy de Maupassant I never read short stories. They never have thoroughly drawn characters or plot--but this one is fantastic! Since I had previously read most of the authors I am familiar with their characters but never in situations and with 'partners' like this. Almost every story is a jewel laden with humor and full stories. Can't wait for next year's matchup!

MatchUp takes eleven of the world’s best female thriller writers and pairs them up with eleven of the world’s best male thriller writers. A matchup of male vs females. Eleven pairs of branded writers together with their iconic characters. I admit I got this book because Lee Child's name was on the cover and he is one of my favorite authors. However this anthology has an awesome list of authors, some I have read and others that are on my TBR shelf.

Favorite: Karin Slaughter/Michael Koryta - suspenseful and funny

Sandra Brown/CJ Box 4 stars
Val McDermind/Peter James 2 stars
Kathy Reich/Lee Childs 4 stars
Diana Gabaldon/Steve Berry 3 stars
Gale Lynds/Dave Morrell 4 stars
Karin Slaughter/Michael Koryta 4 stars
Charlaine Harris/Andrew Gross 3 stars
Lisa Jackson/John Sandford 4 stars
Lara Adrain/Christopher Rice 2 stars
Lisa Scottoline/Nelson De Mille 3 stars
J.A Jance/Eric Van Lustbader 3 stars

Excellent short stories that will appeal to all my mystery loving customers. I came across a few authors I would like to check out.

Gave me a chance to sample new authors. Love it. I will be reading more from Cj Box.