Crime is common ground for the twenty-one women writers in this extraordinary collection of contemporary mystery fiction. The voices here include professional crime solvers who take you from the mean streets of V.I. Warshawski's Chicago in a case of music and murder... to the California freeway where Kinsey Millhone's beloved VW skids into a shooting... to the gang-held turf of Sharon says mum's the word.

And then there are mothers, grandmothers, battered wives, and social workers — ordinary women in extraordinary situations whose voices reveal contemporary life as seen through a woman's eye. From the opening tale of a girl down-and-out in London and what she steals from a corpse... to the final story of a summer vacation in the Berkshires, complete with romance and sudden death... this unique collection brings us great mystery writing that engages both our intellects and our hearts.

Contents:

• Eye of a Woman: An Introduction
• Lucky Dip by Liza Cody
• ”Full Circle” by Sue Grafton
• Benny’s Space by Marcia Muller
• The Puppet by Dorothy Salisbury Davis
• The Scar by Nancy Pickard
• Murder Without a Text by Amanda Cross
• Discards by Faye Kellerman
• Getting to Know You by Antonia Fraser
• A Match Made in Hell by Julie Smith
• Theft of the Poet by Barbara Wilson
• Death and Diamonds by Susan Dunlap
• Kill the Man for Me by Mary Wings
• The Cutting Edge by Marilyn Wallace
• Looking for Thelma by Gillian Slovo
• Deborah’s Judgment by Margaret Maron
• A Man’s Home by Shelley Singer
• Her Good Name by Carolyn G. Hart
• Ghost Station by Carolyn Wheat
• Where Are You, Monica? by Maria Antonia Oliver
• Settled Score by Sara Paretsky
• That Summer at Quichiquois by Dorothy B. Hughes