BEST AMERICAN CRIME WRITING (2002)

Annual writing compilations tend to be dicey propositions -- by their nature dependent on fickle things like the taste of a guest editor or the snapshot quality of one year's work. But Pileggi, Penzler, and Cook have done something remarkable with their collection, culling an artful mix of the political, the odd, the macabre, and the downright brilliant; the latter description reserved for Nancy Gibbs' stunning Time magazine piece written the day after the attacks on the Twin Towers. From Robert Draper's account of the heartbreaking Tina Marie Cornelius child murders in Texas to Mark Singer's hilarious take on a cockfighting controversy in Oklahoma, the entire collection is an even mix of why didn't I clip that? and how did I miss that? Avid true-crime readers, take note.