Dead Man's Hand: Crime Fiction at the Poker Table

by Otto Penzler, Howard Lederer (Introduction), Parnell Hall (Contributor)

Hit the jackpot with stories from Michael Connelly, Laura Lippman, Walter Mosley, Alexander McCall Smith, and more superstars of mystery. In “One Dollar Jackpot,” Michael Connelly’s curmudgeonly Harry Bosch finds himself going toe-to-toe with a professional poker player. Jeffery Deaver offers up “Bump,” a tale of a has-been actor trying to make it big by hustling cards. “Hardly Knew Her” by Laura Lippmann showcases a young woman learning about bluffing the hard way, while “In the Eyes of Children” by Alexander McCall Smith features a scam at a poker table on the high seas.   With these, and more offerings from mystery greats such as Joyce Carol Oates, John Lescroart, Walter Mosley, Peter Robinson, and Eric Van Lustbader, Dead Man’s Hand is a suspenseful anthology that’s a big winner for any fan of crime fiction.

Genres: Short Stories, Mystery, Crime, Fiction, Thriller, Games

405 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 5, 2007

About the author

Otto Penzler is an editor of mystery fiction in the United States, and proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City, where he lives.

Otto Penzler founded The Mysteriour Press in 1975 and was the publisher of The Armchair Detective, the Edgar-winning quarterly journal devoted to the study of mystery and suspense fiction, for seventeen years.

Penzler has won two Edgar Awards, for The Encyclopedia of Mystery and Detection in 1977, and The Lineup in 2010. The Mystery Writers of America awarded him the prestigious Ellery Queen Award in 1994, and the Raven--the group's highest non-writing award--in 2003.

Reviews

[Bob Redmond · Rating 2 out of 5]

Poker. Crime. Writing. Stories by Joyce Carol Oates, Walter Mosley, and others. How could this book be bad?

Yet it is bad, bad like a bad poker hand: let's say a 10-6, unsuited. It keeps _wanting_ to be something, but in the end you go bust. So there are a few good stories, but not much worth holding onto in the end.

[Suhasa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating for "Monks of the Abby Victoria" short story.
Cleverly done!

[Wayland Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

A somewhat uneven collection, as can happen. Some of these stories were great, some less so. I question the wisdom of the strip poker story (you know there had to be one) having a minor protagonist, for one thing, but the one set in Hollywood was really well done.

Overall, I'd recommend the anthology, but the pieces have very uneven quality. If you like crime fiction or are a poker fan, by all means, dig in, you'll likely enjoy the majority of the stories at the very least.

It did get me curious enough to look up some of the authors' other work, which is frequently the point of these kinds of collections.

[Charlotte · Rating 3 out of 5]

My quest to read all of Michael Connelly's short stories continues with this poker/gambling/cards-themed collection. Connelly's story is One-Dollar Jackpot. The obvious tie-in here is that Harry Bosch's ex-wife was a professional poker player, so Bosch had heard of the murder victim who also played professionally. His story is very good--long enough to develop the plot, and plenty of classic Connelly procedural details. I wasn't interested in any of the others. In general I am finding the free-form anthologies more appealing than the themed ones as the requirement to write to a theme creates a feeling of falsity and contrivance.

[Jay Rain · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rating - 6.6

Some so-so reads but mostly a lot of shorts that leave the reader unfulfilled (even the Deaver was un-Deaveresque); Might give mystery-shorts one more go as there could have been so much more

Poker is a game of intrigue, profile & manipulation which is lacking throughout (spare the odd story like $1 Bill & Eastvale Ladies Poker Club), rather it is an afterthought & not used contextually correct

[Phillip · Rating 1 out of 5]

One word sums this book up, and that word is "disapointing". Looked forward to reading it but the stories are badly written and some are difficult to follow, I gave up in the end.

[James Glass · Rating 4 out of 5]

In “One Dollar Jackpot,” Michael Connelly’s curmudgeonly Harry Bosch finds himself going toe-to-toe with a professional poker player. Jeffery Deaver offers up “Bump,” a tale of a has-been actor trying to make it big by hustling cards.
These are some very good stories written by well-renowned and respected authors in this genre. Michael Connelly, Jeffrey Deaver and Joyce Carol Oates just to name a few. I've read a lot of anthologies and this is definitely one of the best I've read. And Otto Penzler did a great job with editing the story and ensuring they meshed well together.

[Paul Grooms · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this anthology. I have enjoyed other anthologies by Otto Penzler, but this one in particular because all of the stories were new to me. His other collections are great but if you are a frequent reader, many of his classic anthologies hold stories you may have read.
I also liked while the stories contained a connection to the the poker game theme, there was a lot of latitude to allow the stories to go farther from the game itself.

[SK · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some favourites here - Jeffrey Deaver, Joyce Carol Oates, Laura Lipmann, Lustbader. Found Walter Mosley interesting; will definitely more of his work.
Very well narrated, kept me engrossed. Not all stories are directly related to poker, but the short stories are diverse and usually related to crime.

[Armand Rosamilia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not a bad story in the bunch, which is very rare in an anthology. There's usually one tale that is too different from all the rest, just brushes against the theme or is, well, poorly written. Not here. Crime and poker are tied together perfectly in every story, and each one was unique and very good. I found a couple of new authors to read more of, too.

[Jack Webb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Penzler deals a winner

Unsurprisingly, Mr. Penzler has again put together a class anthology, in this case with original stories written for this collection. Turns out poker and crime are a winning combination.

[Denise]

Returned this ebook to library - all stories about gambling which made it uninteresting for me

[Aimee · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was okay. Anthologies have some stories that are more of a filler material than anything memorable. Good enough but I don’t think I’ll remember many of these.

[Adrain · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the stories are interesting and some seem a bit of a stretch.

[Maryjane Coons · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it some more then others

[Thad Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great short story collection. Many winning stories and no duds.

[Cindy B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

All of the plots are interesting, engaging, and worthwhile reading. Some pull readers more (differing tastes). Narrators (and writers) are professionals adding to enjoyment. My fav is … 4-⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[Ann Keeran · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poker, Anyone?

Interesting and thrilling stories based on life with poker. A fascinating read, some of the stories are deadly, all of them are terrific.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good selection of poker themed short stories, each with a twist. Jeffrey Deaver's story stands out.

[Mj · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh. Short stories.
Read 1st 2. Stupid
Read Michael Connelly. It was well done.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a saying among poker players. If you've been at the table for thirty minutes and you don't know who the mark is, you are. When the game is penny ante poker, all you stand to lose is a few dollars. But when the game is murder, you stand to lose a whole lot more.

As Otto Penzler remarks in the foreword, "The biggest surprise about putting together a collection of stories combining poker and crime is that it has not been done before now." Dead Man's Hand features fifteen stories by some wonderful story tellers, including Alexander McCall Smith, Michael Connelly, Jeffery Deaver and Joyce Carol Oates. Like most anthologies, the stories are somewhat uneven, which is just another way of saying you'll have your favorites. My favorite is The Monks of the Abbey Victoria, by Rupert Holmes. Four married men, executives at a TV network, meet for poker every Monday night. Or they don't. Armed with a well-rehearsed alibi, each of the men has a night free of obligations, business or personal. Separately, and in secret, each of the men is free to indulge their fantasies. Until, the newest member of the group discovers, far too late, who the mark is.

You don't have to be a poker player to enjoy Dead Man's Hand (but you'll probably enjoy it more if you are).

Shuffle up and deal.

[Tuxlie]

If ever a subject begged to be associated with crime it is gambling, writes Otto Penzler in his introduction to this collection of short stories set at the poker table and beyond. In Walter Mosley’s Mister In-Between, a bagman is sent to collect from a rigged poker game, but soon begins to wonder who the real mark is. In One Dollar Jackpot, Michael Connelly’s detective Harry Bosch finds himself looking for tells when facing off against a professional poker player in the interrogation room. And a young woman learns how to bluff the hard way in Hardly Knew Her, by Laura Lippman. In these and others stories, aces of the mystery-writing world—including Joyce Carol Oates, Alexander McCall Smith, Jeffery Deaver, John Lescroart, and others—combine to form a winning hand.

[Michael McGrinder · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wild Bill Hickok was holding Aces and eights when he was shot in the back of the head, giving birth to the term "Dead Man's Hand." Like most short-story collections this one is uneven. It appears several authors were unfamiliar with poker: a faulted understanding of Texas Hold'em, mistaking the muck (discards) for the mush, and an overuse of poker cliches. The outstanding piece is "Strip Poker" by Joyce Carol Oates. If you overlook the amateur's approach to the poker world, you can settle in for a decent read.

[Raphael Vincent · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think this deserves a proper review, not just a handful of words off of me. Sadly, I can't really work on it right now since my appreciation of the anthology was inconsistent at best, tedious at its worst. Only the last story by Lorenzo Carcaterra ever gave me the impulse to even have my two cents here, or to even give it another chance, so I will. I will give this book another chance and hopefully I'd have something more substantial to say about it other than the fact that it wasn't a page turner.

[Gail · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of short stories using poker as part of the plot in some way or another. All of the stories are well written, inventive, and great fiction. It is also mostly male. Probably because the interest in card gambling is mostly male and includes mobsters, collusion, and corruption. Not particularly my cup of tea.

[Tom Mueller]

The contributors to this is a "Who's Who" of Crime/Mystery fiction.
Includes "One-Dollar Jackpot", a Bosch short story by Michael Connelly.
Another great short; Joyce Carrol Oates' "Strip Poker", is an atypical 'coming of age' story Oates is so well known for.

[Richard Givan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would rarely give a book of short stories by different writers five stars, but this one deserves it. All these stories involve poker playing and every one is a crackerjack story. Many top writers at the top of their game here.

[Toni · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this collection. Each story was a little bit different, but all tied together by poker. A fun lunchtime read.

[Debby Allen · Rating 3 out of 5]

some good, some not so. nothing that made me want to pursue more by any author.