I'm not usually a fan of short stories, but the Matchup (#692) anthology, edited by Lee Child, is an exception to that rule. All of the short stories here are thrillers; the hook is that each story pairs a well-known female writer in the genre with a male counterpart, featuring a "match up" of their iconic characters. Although I recognized the names of these writers, for many of them, it's the first time I've read any of their work. I was not disappointed. (Okay, confession; my least favorite story was a vampire/Radiant match up. Too easy to picture a Grace Jones/Fabio look-alike couple as the illustration for this one!).
Where else can you meet Jack Reacher and Temperance Brennan teamed up to solve a case? (Kathy Reichs and Lee Child). Or how about Steve Berry's Cotton Malone encountering Diana Gabaldon's Outlander characters in pursuit of an antiquarian book? The match ups here are those of familiar fictional characters' strengths and skills in pursuing crimes, not each other. If you follow any of these writers included in the anthology, it's fun to watch their creations play off each other.
Although the eleven novellas and short stories here come in at over four hundred pages, time seemed to fly by while I was absorbed in these tales. Darn, I've just added another list of authors I'll have to find time to read!
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