So, if by any chance you're not too familiar with this writer, you may easily guess that Woolrich has been a real master of the genre called noir, the author of countless pieces of both short and long fiction featuring either hardboiled detectives or disenchanted cops in their daily fight against organized crime as well as simple greed, human weaknesses, the temptations and the dangers of big American cities in the late '30s and '40s. In Woolrich's world full of petty thieves, ruthless murderers, untalented musicians, unfaithful lovers, fascinating ladies, the eternal struggle between good and evil takes so many forms that one wonders what else is the actual bottom line of our existence.

‘Night and Fear’ collects fourteen short stories published by the author in various genre magazines between 1936 and 1943 when he was in his prime as a pulp writer of detective stories, plus a posthumous short work appeared only in 1970.

The stories are so fresh and engrossing that, although endowed with a distinctive taste of America during late Depression and early war years , they could have been written just yesterday. Reading Woolrich's fiction you have the feeling you're watching a black-and-white suspense movie featuring the likes of Humphrey Bogart or Fred McMurray, yet there's not a single scene or a single dialogue which sounds outdated.

Personally I've seldom enjoyed reading a book as much as this short story collection.

‘Cigarette’ describe the events following the loss of a poisonous cigarette, while in the breathtaking ‘Double Feature’ an off-duty detective going to the movies with his sweetheart unexpectedly meets a dangerous criminal at large.

‘The Heavy Sugar’ is a tense story, oozing suspense from beginning to end, depicting the desperate escape of a penniless man hiding a precious treasure. ‘You bet your life’ portrays the tragic ending of a cruel wager and manages to keep the reader hooked throughout the narrative.

‘Endicott's girl’ is an outstanding, suspenseful tale about a cop trying to cover up the evidence pointing out at his daughter as a possible murderer. A perfect medley of sheer action and emotional study.

An American sailor on leave in an unlikely Japan is the main character of the mediocre ‘Death in the Yoshiwara’ while the parallel lives and different careers of two cops – one honest, one corrupted- are the plot's core of the long tale ‘Detective William Brown,’ a startling journey into the depth of human soul.

In ‘The Case of the Killer-Diller’ a series of strange deaths among the members of a jazz band remains an unsolved puzzle until the final, thrilling scene which equals the level of the best Hitchcock's films. Another great, gripping story is ‘Dead Man's Eye,’ narrated by a 12-year old boy desperately trying to solve a case on behalf of his father, an unsuccessful policeman. The description of the boy stalking the murderer is quite memorable.

‘The Fatal Footlights’ is a superb, dark whodunit about an odd "indirect" murder with an unforeseen twist in the tale while the cruel, chilling ‘Three Kills For One’ is a tale of revenge and determination, featuring the endless confrontation between a former detective and a lucky criminal. In ‘The Rose Death’ a weaker story full of inconsistencies, a girls stakes herself out as a bait to catch a serial killer and so to help her lover, a cop seeking promotion.

‘New York blues’ probably written just before the author's demise, tastes of death and melancholy from the outset, featuring a lonely man trapped in a hotel room and waiting to be apprehended for a pointless homicide.

In short: if you like superb storytelling, great suspense, dark atmospheres and classy thrills, this is the book you were looking for.

Mario Guslandi was born and raised in Milan, Italy, where he’s currently living. He became addicted to horror and supernatural fiction more than twenty years ago, after accidentally reading a reprint anthology of stories by MR James, JS Le Fanu, HP Lovecraft and A Machen. Since then his collection of horror books has expanded to the point of requiring continuous addictions of new shelves to his library, in order to avoid the collapse of the whole structure. Most likely the only Italian who regularly reads (and reviews) dark fiction in English, he’s always tempted to hide his true identity under feigned English or american pen-names, just for the fun of it, but then he keeps forgetting to do that.

© 2005 Laura Hird All rights reserved.