THE BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 1999

With the arrival of winter comes the third annual volume in this series, featuring private eyes, rogue crime fighters, femme fatales, and even ghosts. In Ed Gorman's ''Out There in the Darkness,'' an unexpected break-in transforms complacent suburban poker buddies into terrifying renegades. ''Poachers'' by Tom Franklin has a gamekeeper stalking his human prey on the banks of the Alabama River. Mystery master Lawrence Block brings alive the life of a solitary hitman, while Joyce Carol Oates offers an insidious family drama and Jeffery Deaver creates a masterpiece of deceit. As dusk deepens and nights lengthen, this collection is a twisted, frightening pleasure. A-