Fourteen impossible crimes from the American masters of the form.

Locked-room mysteries have baffled and delighted readers for generations. They always begin with a seemingly impossible crime – a body found inside a windowless room that’s been locked from the inside, for example – and then end with an ingenious and satisfying solution.

This unique collection features fourteen of the finest locked-room mysteries from some of the best writers in the genre, including household names like John Dickson-Carr, Ellery Queen, Clayton Rawson, Stuart Palmer, Frederic Brown and Cornell Woolrich.

Selected by Edgar Award-winning mystery expert and anthologist Otto Penzler, this book takes the reader on an unforgettable journey into the Golden Age of American mystery writing, promising hours of entertainment for armchair detectives young and old.

Otto Penzler owns The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City and founded the Mysterious Press and Otto Penzler Books. He has written and edited several books, including the Edgar Award-winning Encyclopaedia of Mystery and Detection, and is the series editor of the annual Best American Mystery Stories of the Year. Fredric Brown was a prolific writer of multiple genres, including mystery, sci-fi, poetry, and non-fiction, whose work has been championed by Stephen King, Philip K. Dick, Umberto Eco, and many more literary luminaries. In the mystery world, he is best remembered today for his long-running series of mysteries featuring Ed and Am Hunter, who made their first appearance in the Edgar Award winner, The Fabulous Clipjoint. C. Daly King (1895-1963) was an American psychologist and detective story writer. He was born in New York City and educated at Yale University. After fighting in World War I, he worked in textiles and in advertising before returning to school to study psychology, with a particular focus on sleep and consciousness. In the 1930s, King published nine books that quickly established him as a master of the Golden Age mystery, but ceased writing fiction with the advent of World War II. Cornell Woolrich (1903-68) was one of the most admired and influential of all 20th century American crime writers. His work inspired many films, including most famously Rear Window, The Leopard Man, Phantom Lady, The Bride Wore Black, Mississippi Mermaid and Union City. He led a strange and often very unhappy life, latterly as a recluse in a Manhattan hotel.