An excellent Christmas present for yourself or anyone else, as good as a tempting chocolate selection box. I was especially pleased to find something new (to me) from Margery Allingham, whose writing I always enjoy.

Some of the stories in this collection were more heartbreaking than in Edwards' other collections, but they're all excellent.

I'm afraid I found this collection a little disappointing. This series of anthologies is a bit up and down.

"Crimson Snow brings together a dozen vintage crime stories set in winter. Welcome to a world of Father Christmases behaving oddly, a famous fictional detective in a Yuletide drama, mysterious tracks in the snow, and some very unpleasant carol singers. There's no denying that the supposed season of goodwill is a time of year that lends itself to detective fiction.

On a cold night, it's tempting to curl up by the fireside with a good mystery. And more than that, claustrophobic house parties, with people cooped up with long-estranged relatives, can provide plenty of motives for murder.

Including forgotten stories by major writers such as Margery Allingham, as well as classic tales by less familiar crime novelists, each story in this selection is introduced by the leading expert on classic crime, Martin Edwards. The resulting volume is an entertaining and atmospheric compendium of wintry delights."

Sure, releasing this AFTER Christmas seems a little strange, but it's still winter... also I'll be reading it during Christmas, because I have an ARC losers! Haha!

Every season, every holiday, mystery readers look for themed stories to get them in the spirit. Reading a full length book is fine but it may take awhile and not as many will be read. Martin Edwards has put together a wonderful mix of Christmas mysteries from 1900's to contemporary. Some of the Golden Age authors are Margery Allingham and Edgar Wallace. This is the second such collection and I hope to see a third.

This is an excellent mix of seasonal mysteries. Recommended.

A lovely set of stories all with a Christmas theme. A nice book to curl up with on a winters day. Enjoyed the variety of stories i.e. Play, story, no conclusion etc.
I received a copy of this book from Netgalley

Christmas mystery short stories have an enduring appeal, especially to readers who don't have family to spend the holiday season with, or mystery buffs who have family searching for books to give them as gifts. This anthologist has helmed another impressive collection of long-hard-to-find rarities to accompany classics; a mixed bag, as all such collections inevitably are, but solidly entertaining. Nice to see the Allingham story readily available again.

Deep and crisp and even... 4 stars

The latest addition to the British Library themed anthologies of classic crime, this one includes eleven stories all set around the festive season. A great time for people to get together in family gatherings or country house parties, and bump each other off. Who amongst us hasn't thought that the one thing that would improve Christmas would be the quick dispatching of one of our nearest and dearest, or that the only way to pay for all those gifts would be to hasten the inheritance from one of our much loved rich relatives? Or is that just me? On the basis of the evidence in this book, I'm not alone in thinking Christmas is a particularly jolly time for a murder...

As with the earlier anthologies, this one is introduced and edited by Martin Edwards who also gives a short introduction to each story telling a little about the author. There's the usual mix of well-known authors – Margery Allingham, Edgar Wallace – and forgotten ones, and as always the quality of the individual stories varies. However, overall I thought this was a more consistent collection than the last couple – none of the stories rate as less than three stars for me and there are plenty of fours and a sprinkling of fives. The lengths also vary from a few pages to a couple of the stories being what I'd think of as novelette length – taking an hour or so to read.

There's a nice variety of whodunits and howdunits, some dark and serious, others lighter and more quirky, and a few with ghostly aspects to add to the winter chills. And there's fog and feverish policemen, and wicked carol-singers, and isolated houses with all access cut off by snow... perfect accompaniment to a mug of hot chocolate and a seat near the fire!

Here are a few of the ones I enjoyed most...

The Ghost's Touch by Fergus Hume – when the narrator is invited to spend the festive season as a guest in a haunted country house, one feels he should have swiftly invented a prior engagement. However, clearly he doesn't read crime novels, because off he goes, all cheerful and expecting to have a good time. Hah! After the fire, the ghost, and a meeting with the murderer at the dead of night, I suspect he changed his mind... The plot in this one is totally obvious, but nevertheless the author manages to get a nice atmosphere of tension going, and it's very well written.

Death in December by Victor Gunn – a great cross between ghost and crime story, this one is probably going to appear on a future Tuesday Terror! Post so I won't go into detail. It's one of the longer stories in the collection, giving time for a bit more characterisation than usual and both the detectives, grumpy Bill “Ironside” Cromwell and his sidekick, lovely Johnny Lister, are well drawn and fun. There are aspects of both who and how in this one, not to mention some genuinely scary bits, all topped off with a lot of humour. And a nice little bit of detection too...

Mr Cork's Secret by Macdonald Hastings – When Montague Cork's firm insures a valuable necklace, Montague begins to worry about its safety. So off he goes with his wife to a top London hotel where the owner of the necklace is expected to be staying. He's lucky to get a room at such short notice, especially at Christmas time. Not so lucky for the person who vacated the room, though – since he was carried out feet first by the police, headed for the morgue. Could the murder have anything to do with the necklace? It's up to Montague to find out... This has a nice twist in that when it was originally published the author held one fact back as part of a competition. Edwards has left it like that, but at the end of the book, gives the solution as provided by the author, along with the prize-winners' suggestions.

Deep and Crisp and Even by Michael Gilbert – PC Petrella is covering for his boss over Christmas, and takes his duties seriously. So it's unfortunate that he develops a feverish cold leaving him weak and a bit confused. But when he suspects a house in the neighbourhood has been burgled, he's determined to track the perpetrator, even when he's near collapse himself. Complete with carol-singing, dreadful weather and seasonal illness, this is a fun little story with a neat twist.

So plenty of good stuff here, and a lot of the stories make excellent use of either weather or the holidays to add to the atmosphere and tension. I'm thoroughly enjoying these anthologies – even the less good stories are always fun for seeing the different attitudes and writing styles of the time, and the little author bios add a bit of context, putting each story into its appropriate place in the development of crime fiction. I also like the way they're themed, and this theme in particular works well – I suppose that these would mostly have originally been published in Christmas editions of magazines, and perhaps that inspired the authors to show off their best. Next to the London-themed one, this is probably my favourite of the collections so far. I do hope there will be more...

NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, Poisoned Pen Press.

Fun mysteries the to read when the holidays are near and the weather is cold. If you don't connect with one, simply move on to another!

Crimson Snow is an exemplary collection of tales from both well known authors and less familiar hidden gems.  Poisoned Pen Press does an excellent job of gathering an assortment of thrilling and unusual tales, and Martin Edwards, as always, provides fascinating introductory material before each story.  Don’t be deceived.  While this excellent anthology features many tales set during the holiday season, it is easily enjoyed year round.  If you are a mystery enthusiast, you absolutely must add this British Library Crime Classic to your collection.  

I’m hard pressed to choose which story I enjoyed most.  Death in December featuring curmudgeonly Chief Inspector Ironsides Cromwell offers readers a manor house ghost story, complete with murder and a disappearing body.  The Man with the Sack challenges Albert Campion to find stolen jewels and save a fledgling romance.  Mr Cork’s Secret tasks the popular insurance investigator with solving a murder, finding missing gems, redeeming one thief and preventing another from escaping…and these are just the beginning.  The wide range of tales is extremely satisfying.  I highly recommend Crimson Snow to anyone who enjoys classic mysteries.

5/5

I received a copy of Crimson Snow from the publisher and netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.

—Crittermom

The Ghost's Touch by Fergus Hume
I had read The Mystery of a Hansom Cab and enjoyed it so I wasn't surprised that I enjoyed this short story as well. The narrator (Lascelles) is spending Christmas at Ringshaw Grange where the owner is very poor but has the family estate while his cousin is very rich but has no property. The narrator is invited to the family estate for Christmas where it turns out the entire party is all men under the age of thirty. Also at the family estate? A ghost that is supposed to be a former Ringshaw bride who kills people who sleep in a certain room. The room the rich cousin is put in. The rich cousin who has a heart problem.
Lascelles smells a rat and surreptitiously switches rooms with the rich cousin. The story plays out in a wonderful and enjoyable manner.

Four stars.

The Chopham Affair by Edgar Wallace
A blackmailing gigolo (Alphonse/Alphonso RIbiera) is found dead in a car next to an equally dead car thief.

Short, sweet, interesting. 4 stars

The Man with the Sack by Margery Allingham
Albert Campion has been invited to Christmas by one of his insufferable relatives. At first he's going to decline, but then his cousin writes him also pleading for him to come. It seems that she is in love with a poor man whose father was sent to jail for theft but her mother is pushing her at the young man of their guests, the son of an insufferable, newly wealthy family.
On the way down, Albert sees someone that he recognizes, a thief that he saw prosecuted many years ago. But he puts it in the back of his mind as he settles in for Christmas with his family, with the rich guests, and his cousin's beau. There is mention of a twelve thousand pound (cost, not weight) necklace that, of course, goes missing and the beau is immediately accused of the theft.

Pure Campion goodness, 4 stars

Christmas Eve by S. C. Roberts
A Sherlockian play where a young woman comes to Holmes for help because her employers necklace has been stolen but Holmes can't seem to follow the plot.

Serviceable, three stars

Death in December by Victor Gunn
Chief Inspector Bill "Ironsides" Cromwell is going to his assistant's family home for Christmas. Begrudging and grumbling as usual, he is nonetheless as shocked as his assistant to see a mysterious figure in the drive who disappears and leaves no footprints. Then someone brings up the subject of the family "Death Room" and a particularly annoying neighbor becomes insistent on spending the night, despite the host's obvious discomfort. In a surprise, he is not the one who ends up dead. Rather he sees a dead body but it has then mysteriously disappeared and now he has descended into what may be permanent lunacy.
Ironsides seems to have a clear idea of what might have happened even when the others seem stymied. The solution is a little out there but I enjoyed it.

Four stars

Murder at Christmas by Christopher Bush
A former swindler is murdered. There are a few of his victims in the small town and it's up to the narrator to help figure out how, with so many good alibis, the man could have died.

Three stars

Off the Tiles by Ianthe Jerrold
A woman, trying to help her neighbor get into her locked house, has fallen off the roof. Was it the neighbor who hated the dead woman for trying to woo her nephew into the arts (literally, he's a painter)? Or was there something more sinister at work?

An interesting twist, three and a half stars

Mr. Cork's Secret
Monsieur Aloysia, hotel manager, has a few problems. His hotel is overrun by the press hoping to get pictures of a film star and his new wife (who haven't yet arrived), his hotel is booked to the gills and there are still people asking to come, and there's a dead body in room 143. Luckily, the well-known insurance man, Mr. Cork, is one of the people wanting a room. It seems Mr. Cork has ensured some of the film stars' jewelry for a rather fabulous amount and he wanted to see about his investment. And it's a good thing he did so he can help solve the murder.

Three stars

The Santa Claus Club by Julian Symons
A detective is hired to protect a man who is receiving threatening letters. The man is a very rich one who gathers with other rich men to very ostentatiously raise money for charity every year. They take turns dressing up as Santa and collecting the funds. Our detective's customer ends up dead by the detective is able to solve the case.

Three stars

Deep and Crisp and Even by Michael Gilbert
I'm not sure that I completely understood this one. A young policeman, Petrella, is left in charge while in between Superintendent's and believes that something nefarious may be going on at the local boarding house.

Two stars

The Carol Singers by Josephine Bell
Mrs. Fairlands lives in her converted house quite happily, even at eighty-one years old. At least, she lives that way until Christmas Eve when she is robbed, tied up, and left to die in her own home. It's up to Inspector Brooks to figure out this... rather confusing mystery.

Three stars

Overall a nice pick of mysteries and a book I enjoyed. 4 stars
This book came out January 3

I agree with reviewer Patto that this is among the best British Library Crime Classics short story collections. There are no great stories here, but no terrible ones either. The worst ones are silly or illogical, but entertaining nonetheless. Most of the stories follow classic golden age conventions, but the solutions are obvious. "Surprise" endings that will surprise no one are common. I suspect most of them were commissioned by periodicals that preferred not to challenge their readers.

Josephine Bell's The Carol Singers is exceptionally atmospheric, with a depressing but believable worldview that makes up for its comically absurd plot. In fact, I suspect the author started with a comic story and got caught up in the sadness, or started to write pathos and decided to lighten it up a bit.

The Chopham Affair by Edgar Wallace is a humorous story at heart, despite the violence. It has all the energy and action for which Wallace is famous, and sets some interesting scenes.

There are some other good stories in here as well, and the commonalities of snow and cold add some interest. The introductions are short and to the point. I recommend this book to all golden age mystery fans.

“It’s the bloke who spends the night in the haunted chamber who always cops it in the neck.”

Crimson Snow, a collection of crime stories set around the Christmas season is a perfect companion read to Mystery in White. Short story collections are a wonderful way to ‘try out’ new authors, and in the case of Crimson Snow, I had a reunion with Margery Allingham and met some new (to me) interesting authors. And here’s the line-up:

The Ghost’s Touch: Fergus Hume

The Chopham Affair: Edgar Wallace

The Man with the Sack: Margery Allingham

Christmas Eve: S.C. Roberts

Death in December: Victor Gunn

Murder at Christmas: Christopher Bush

Off the Tiles: Ianthe Jerrold

Mr Cork’s Secret: Macdonald Hastings

The Santa Claus Club: Julian Symons

Deep and Crisp and Even: Michael Gilbert

The Carol Singers: Josephine Bell

Solution to Mr Cork’s Secret: (author’s solution and two winning entries)

I shan’t cover every story in the review, but will instead focus on some favourites. The collection itself presents a pleasant variety with private citizens, an unpaid PI, and a few policemen in the mix. While there’s a range of stories, I found myself really enjoying the blend of voices here.


I’ve been meaning to read Fergus Hume’s The Mystery of the Hansom Cab for years, so I was delighted to read his short story, The Ghost’s Touch, in which the narrator, Doctor Lascalles is invited by an Australian friend, Frank Ringan to spend Christmas at the “family seat near Christchurch.” Frank, whose father made his fortune in the “gold-digging days” is the wealthy member of the family, but the “head of the family” is Frank’s cousin impoverished Percy Ringan. Alarm bells ring in the mind of any self-respecting crime reader when we learn that the Ringan cousins have made their wills in each other’s favour.

Frank is extremely proud of the ancestral estate and “the position and antiquity of his family,” so he’s thrilled to spend a traditional English Christmas at the ancestral estate at Ringshaw Grange.

It was a wonderful old barrack of a place, with broad passages, twisting interminable like the labyrinth of Daedalus; small bedrooms furnished in an old-fashioned manner; and vast reception apartments with polished floors and painted ceilings.

At Ringshaw Grange, however, things begin to go wrong when there’s an unexplained fire in Frank’s bedroom and he’s moved to the notorious haunted chamber, the Blue Room. …

Edgar Wallace’s The Chopham Affair was another pleasant surprise. In the introduction, Martin Edwards states that while “subtlety was not” Wallace’s strongest point, “his short stories have arguably stood the test of time.” The Chopham Affair, a story of blackmail and murder, was excellent, and this is how it begins:

Lawyers who write books are not, as a rule, popular with their confrères, but Archibald Lenton, the most brilliant of prosecuting attorneys, was an exception.

Off the Tiles from Ianthe Jerrold is a short story with a twist as it ends not so much with a solution (which does occur) as with an observation on the unwavering consistency of human behaviour. The story is an investigation into the death of a woman who appears to have fallen off of her roof. Hostilities exist between the dead woman and her neighbours and the dead woman’s sister insists that murder has occurred.

The Man with the Sack from Margery Allingham was a delight. It’s a story in which we find poor Albert Campion roped into being an unpaid PI during a Christmas gathering which takes place at the home of some old friends. In The Santa Claus Club from Julian Symons, private investigator Francis Quarles is employed by the wealthy Lord Acrise who has been receiving threatening letters from a man who went to prison decades earlier. Christopher Bush’s Murder at Christmas is the story of a golfing holiday interrupted, most inconveniently, by a murder. Victor Gunn’s amusing Death in December features Chief Inspector Bill ‘Ironsides’ Cromwell who investigates a murder that takes place during the holidays at a castle. A dead body pops up and then everyone finds themselves snowed in….

“A fine place to bring me to for Christmas,” he said sourly. “Ghosts all over the place before we even get indoors!”

Crimson Snow, and what a apt title that is, is a most enjoyable read for the season.

Review copy

A lovingly curated collection of Christmas time mysteries - most of them firmly in the Golden Age thematically or in spirit - with a few outstanding picks. Margery Allingham is always a welcome contributor and there are quite a few new (to me) authors that I will be tracking down. The last story in the collection, unfortunately, is a overly long and not quite up to par with the rest of the book; I suggest skipping that one. Highly recommend.

3.5 stars

This was an enjoyable anthology of mystery stories set in winter or during the holidays. Editor Martin Walker has chosen an assortment of vintage tales and introduced each with an interesting brief bio of the author. As with any book of short stories, some stand out more than others but it's a nicely varied grouping which will particularly appeal to fans of Golden Age detective fiction.

I received an ARC of this collection through Net Galley in exchange for my honest review.

This is a wonderful collection of vintage crime stories. I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed each one. They were all well written and top notch whodunits.
I voluntarily reviewed an advance reading copy of this book.