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Book Review of The Night Of The Wolf

The Night Of The Wolf
WhidbeyIslander avatar reviewed on + 690 more book reviews


The stories, brief plot and my rating (one to five stars):

The Abominable Snowman - a man is stabbed by a bayonet wielded by a snowman. (****)
The Dead Dance at Night - coffins are toppled within a sealed crypt. (***)
The Call of the Lorelei - a man drowns in a pond, possibly lured there by a siren's call (***)
The Golden Ghost - a young girl takes refuge in a miser's home when she is chased by a ghost that appears and disappears (as witnessed by the miser's friend.) (**)
The Tunnel of Death - people are killed in the middle of a soon-to-be-abandoned escalator by shots that couldn't be fired by anyone in the tunnel (*****)
The Cleaver - a man in mining-era Colorado is killed exactly the way a man many miles away dreams it happens (*****)
The Flower Girl - A visit from Father Christmas via flying reindeer and sled leads to the death of a disliked business man (*****)
Rippermania - a police inspector attempts to trap a Jack-the-Ripper copycat (**)
Murder in Cognac - A man is poisoned in his locked and watched room in his tower-house after being threatened by a former friend (***)
The Night of the Wolf - a werewolf seems to be the instrument of death in killings twenty years apart, as told by a group of hunters out for a kill (*****).

Halter's tales range from okay to wonderful; this book benefits from not having the same cast of characters in each story. Some of these stories involve the trick of "no footprints in the snow," but not all are impossible crimes. A nice mix and a book to pick up and read every so often for a change of pace.