What could be scarier than true crime??? These are wonderful short, true articles. I'm constantly amazed at the trechery of my fellow man and woman.

The Best American Crime Writing 2006 rocks! I have enjoyed this series since the first one came out in 2002. If you enjoy short true crime pieces this series is for you. This is the best one in the series since the first volume came out. The stories range from tales of the mob to tales of high prices prostitution and murder.

My favorites include:

Skip Hollandsworth's "The Last Ride of Cowboy Bob," in which he discusses a Texas case of an older woman who cross dresses to rob banks just for fun....

"Altar Ego" by Robert Nelson, where the author describes a decades old case in which a suspect has seemingly been allowed to get away with murder due to a prosecutor being unwilling to prosecute...

"Dr. Evil," by S.C. Gwynne that discusses the case of Dr. Eric Scheffey, a Doctor who preyed on the uneducated and gullable to do surgeries that no rational human being would want or ever need just for insurance/workers compensation money...

and "Blood Feud," by Mary Battiata, about a deadly battle between neighbors and arch nemesis Perry Brooks and John Ames.

All of the stories are great, I just do not have time to mention them all. This book is well worth your time and money.

This year's edition of Otto Penzler's and Thomas H. Cook's BEST AMERICAN CRIME WRITING hasn't a whole lot to recommend it, and most of these stories are pretty blah. I don't know if good crime writing needs space to expand, and suffer with the enforced brevity of a newspaper article or magazine piece, but these tales seem like they were fished out of ancient copies of READERS DIGEST.

Despite the jacket copy, the NEW YORKER piece mannered and successful bank robber, hello? It's like the very definition of "tell us more," for after the whole article was over, I felt that Skip Hollandsworth had just begun to scratch the surface.

Again, the jacket copy says this book is "controversial," without suggesting how. I suppose in any genre a particular year may go opening only to the extent that who knew that in some states, like Virginia apparently, if your neighbor wants to erect a fence, you've got to pay for it! is that controversial or merely absurd? We have states rights for this?

Deanne Stillman, get out of the Mojave, you have mined it enough. Now you're just repeating yourself like an old carbon copy that makes lighter impressions each time. Give yourself a reboost of energy by a move east, south or north, because you're a great writer with the touch of an angel!