INTRODUCTION

Some people say that a proper mystery story ought to be set in one of

two places. If it is a classic whodunnit, it belongs in Agatha Christie

country: the stately Eng/ish manor house situated near a quaint rural

village. If, on the other hand_ the story deals with hard.boiled crime. Ray-

mond Chandler s milieu is a must: the mean streets of Los Angeles, New

York City, or some other Arnencan urban jungle.

Both of these settings have a lot to offer, of course. They have tradition

on their side. having provided a backdrop for some of the genre s best-

known figures from Sherlock Holmes and Jane Marple to Philip Marlowe

and Mike Hammer But dedicated mystery readers know that there is a

wider world out there, a world filled from hemisphere to hemisphere and

from pole to pole with murder, mayhem, and mystery.

Take South America, with its steamy rain forests and remote mountain

ranges, or the islands of the Bahamas with their sun-soaKed beaches and

exotic customs Or look at Europe, with cosmopolitan cities in the West

Paris, Rome_ Amsterdam that provide a sophisticated setting for crime

and detection, while rapidly changing countries in the East (Hungary, Yu-

goslavia, Rumania orq~:r strange and exciting new possibilities for mystery.

In addition, there is Russia, the classic locale for chili ng intrigue, the Far

East (China. Japan, and Korea b, with ancient traditions and intricate his-

tory; and, while we re at it, is there anywhere in the world more steeped in

mystery than Egypt? Even Agatha Christie sent her characters there, in one

of her most popular novels. Death on the Nile.

Canny mystery writers from Edgar Allan Poe onward have seen the ap-

peal of foreign vistas and have set stories in some of the world s most exotic

locales. Seasoned mystery readers have gone along with them from the

start, and joined in their travels to explore villainy and vice across the globe.

In the following stories you will be invited to share Just such a homicidal

holiday with some of your favorite authors: Ruth RendelL Simon Brett.

Isaac Asimov. Lawrence Block. Joan Aiken. Joyce Porter. Jeffry Scott,

Ge0rges Simenon. and many more. Along the way, you will stop at every

conunent in the world even Antarctica!) and more than a few beautiful and

deadly islands in-between

Your trip will take you from the darkest depths of the Brazilian jungle to

the banks of the Nile. from the back alleys of Colombia to the main avenues

~i. of Italy and France, and from the waterways of Greece to the endless desert