Foreign Bodies is a delectable treat for those who enjoy classic mysteries.  This assortment of stories, many never before published in English, demonstrate just how universal the love of a good puzzle is.  At the same time that appreciation of crime fiction was in its heyday in the English speaking world, it was rising in popularity around the world.  Little was I aware of the great variety of skilled authors of detective fiction living around the globe. I absolutely adored this anthology.  Every story was a delight.  There wasn't a single one that I did not enjoy.  Like the other anthologies edited and introduced by Martin Edwards, each story is prefaced by a short biography of the author detailing his or her origin and their role in history.  

Foreign Bodies is a magnificent anthology certain to spark interest in authors rarely recognized in the English speaking world.

5 / 5

I received a copy of Foreign Bodies from the publisher and Netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.

— Crittermom

Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for a digital galley of this collection of short stories.

My rating for this collection of fifteen translated mystery short stories should probably be 3.5 stars if judged solely by my enjoyment of the majority of items included in the collection. I assign 4 stars mainly because of the convenience of having such a wide assortment of translated stories all in one volume and because of their historical interest. Martin Edwards has gathered a collection which was two years in the making so mystery fans can compare and contrast authors we've probably not read before with the more available American and British authors. The stories are presented in chronological order by Edwards as much as possible.

THE SWEDISH MATCH, Anton Chekhov, Russian
A SENSIBLE COURSE OF ACTION, Palle Rosenkrantz, Danish
STRANGE TRACKS, Balduin Groller, Arad, Hungary (later Romania)
THE KENNEL, Maurice Level, French
FOOTPRINTS IN THE SNOW, Maurice Leblanc, French
THE RETURN OF LORD KINGWOOD, Ivans (Jakob van Schevichaven), Netherlands
THE STAGE BOX MURDER, Paul Rosenhayn, Germany
THE SPIDER, Koga Saburo (Haruta Yoshitame), Japanese
THE VENOM OF THE TARANTULA, Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay, India
MURDER A LA CARTE, Jean-Toussaint Samat, French
THE COLD NIGHT'S CLEARING, Keikichi Osaka (Suzuki Fukutara), Japanese
THE MYSTERY OF THE GREEN ROOM, Pierre Very, French
KIPPERS, John Flanders (Jean-Raymond-Marie De Kerner), Belgium
THE LIPSTICK AND THE TEACUP, Havank (Hendrikus Frederikus van der Kallen), Dutch
THE PUZZLE OF THE BROKEN WATCH, Maria Elvira Bermudez, Mexican

As is perfectly natural with an assortment of this type I enjoyed some of the stories more than others. I don't plan to track down other works by any of these authors, but it was interesting from the historical progression viewpoint to have the stories gathered in this one place. For me, because of the subject material, it's pretty hard to go wrong when reading one of these collections from Martin Edwards and the British Library Crime Classics.

I have developed an almost academic interest in Crime Fiction of the Victorian age and the Golden Age, so this book was hugely interesting to me. It is an anthology of crime writing from the later parts of the 19th century up to roughly WWII from various countries. Fascinating how Sherlock has influenced writers everywhere, but how the interpretation of him varies so widely depending on where you are in the "world". However, if you just want to read some crime fiction, then this may not be that fascinating or enjoyable.

This book is a collection of assorted stories. The assortment has the thread of mystery running through them all.

The fascination of 'whodunits' of any sort started early for me, having graduated directly from Enid Blyton to Agatha Christie.
These are some stories that predate Agatha Christie and some that don't. Most of them are translated into English for our convenience. They are a fun read, and within the short span os the tale, the case is built and solved.They are based in times that are alien to me, but still serve as a character study on what was considered important during that time period. Not all the stories are great but for a collection, it is a good one.

Like most collections, these stories varied in quality. I found a few that were enchanting, but the majority did not keep my interest.

Editor Martin Edwards has performed a real service to English-speaking readers by introducing a century’s worth of fictional sleuths from around the globe, many of which have never made it into translation. The short stories in Foreign Bodies come from writers from Denmark, the Netherlands, Mexico, Japan, Germany, Belgium, Russia and many, many from France.

Unfortunately, there are more misses than hits. Anton Chekov kicks off the anthology with a short story that’s no The Cherry Orchard or The Three Sisters; actually, it’s pretty much unreadable. But don’t let that put you off! There are still plenty of delicious tales that prove that the mystery genre isn’t confined to British and American authors, making this book worth a read. “A Sensible Course of Action” by Palle Rosenkrantz (Danish), the shocking “The Kennel” by Maurice Level (French), “Footprints in the Snow” by Maurice Leblanc (French), “The Return of Lord Kingwood” by Ivans (pen name for Dutch author Jakob van Shevichaven), “The Stage Box Murder” by Paul Rosenhayn (German), “The Cold Night’s Clearing” by Keikichi Osaka (Japanese), the horrifying “Kippers” by John Flanders (Flemish) and “The Puzzle of the Broken Watch” by María Elvira Bermúdez (Mexican).

And special thanks to Edwards, an English solicitor and a mystery writer in his own right, for including the sly, clever “The Mystery of the Green Room” by Pierre Véry, my very favorite entry. Unfortunately, I could only find his works in the original French! Quelle terrible! I hope that British Library and Poisoned Pen Press will rectify this tragedy by releasing Véry’s novels in English.

In the interest of full disclosure, I received this book from NetGalley, British Library and Poisoned Pen Press in exchange for an honest review.

Fans of classic mysteries, mystery and horror short stories and translated literature will enjoy this collection of tales. A delight of 15 stories, at least half of which will take your fancy and make the purchase worthwhile. I particularly enjoyed the macabre Japanese horror story featuring spiders and the Christmas antidote "Footprints in the Snow". While I would have re-arranged the order of the stories, there were many surprises and enjoyments - puzzles and locked rooms aplenty.

Martin Edwards always has just well written anthologies. This one is all about foreign writers of mystery which did not necessarily make to the translation stage until this book.
The stories are of the era, but the prove extremely different to their counterpart in the English mystery fiction. Each story has a little bit about the author of the story that follows, which in itself is interesting - such as how many foreign writers had work produced to film.
I did enjoy this book both for educational value as much as the mysteries. Some stories are better than others, but on the whole a good read.

This was a fascinating introduction to the world of classic crime and mystery stories from the golden age of crime fiction, from all over the world. It starts with a surprising and delightful story by Chekhov and gives us a truly global experience with stories from Japan, Mexico and France to name but a few. Each story comes with an introduction as to the work of the author and some background to the story. These were really helpful in setting the scene, particularly as to where they take their places in the pantheon of crime fiction. It was good to see such a diverse collection, including some more macabre stories that are almost horror rather than crime. I enjoyed each of the stories. I can't say I was gripped, as I would be with a more modern thriller, but they were genuinely interesting and there are some authors I would happily read more from.

This book contains 15 short crime stories by different authors of different countries such as Belgium, France, Japan and South America. It is like an anthology of foreign authors who were all famous at their time and in their country for their crime or detective stories. This book tries to 'celebrate their achievements' by bringing their writings and names back. As the authors come from different countries even continents, their stories and writing techniques vary as do their crimes and detections.
Some stories are of milder nature while others are bone-chilling like the 'Murder a la Carte' by Jean-Toussaint Samart from France.
The stories read easily and are informative of how different crime can be expressed. The book is of interest to anybody who wants to expand their knowledge beyond English crime/detective stories and writers.

Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the digital ARC.

This volume consists of an Introduction by Martin Edwards and a collection of fifteen vintage crime stories in translation from Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands and Russia. Some are making their first appearance in English. The oldest dates from 1883, the most recent from 1960.

The editor claims in his Introduction that:-

“In one or two cases, the stories are notable primarily for their historic or curiosity value;
in other instances, they offer memorable samples of the world’s most popular fictional
genre.”

Many readers may find the first story, “The Swedish Match” by Anton Chekov somewhat hard going. Certainly, it is overly long, but what we have here is a parody of the type of deductive reasoning used by Sherlock Holmes, in a story which predates the first Holmes by four years. This makes it valuable and well worth reading.

I found the majority of the plots in this volume very predictable and most of the solutions easy to work out. I suspect that what we have here are not the best examples of non-English classic crime writing, but the best available. There may be better stories which, for copyright or other reasons, could not be included.

Some of these authors are unjustly neglected outwith their own countries because their stories have not, until now, been made available to the huge English-reading public. Others may simply not be more than second rate.

Apart from the Chekov, the best writing/translation is to be found in “The Cold Night’s Clearing” by Keikichi Osaka. The quirkiest tale is “Kippers” by John Flanders. The prize for the cleverest and most amusing goes to “The Mystery of the Green Room” by Pierre Véry.

Overall. I was slightly disappointed but perhaps my expectations were set overly high.

I received a copy of this collection of crime stories from the publisher via Netgalley.

I found these stories highly variable, both in terms of their content and the quality/style of the translation. Broadly speaking, I was disappointed with the first few stories, and underwhelmed by the the last third of the collection, but in the middle there were a few enjoyable tales. Not all are "detective" stories and some are not even mysteries as such. The length of the series means that many operate at an intellectual/working out the puzzle level, with very underwritten characters.

My favourites included "The Kennel" (very short and shocking), "The Spider" (ingenious), and "The Return of Lord Kingswood" (likeable detective).

As the biographies make clear, most of these authors wrote widely, including full length novels, and I can see this collection being an introduction to the further works of the authors showcased here.