Why exists this fascination with crime on the part of female writers? Bestselling novelist Elizabeth George poses this question in her Introduction, answers it with her customary elegance and illustrates it with a rich and varied collection of international writers, some household names; others buried treasures waiting to be rediscovered.

The stories have locations as diverse as Africa and the Caribbean, London and Los Angeles, San Francisco and Switzerland. Some are modern; some period. Some feature well-known sleuths - Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson, Jemina Shore - or notorious villains - Jack the Ripper; others are tales of 'ordinary' people caught up in out of the ordinary events.

All of them share in common a desire to explore mankind in a moment on the edge. The edge equates to the crime committed. How the characters deal with the edge is the story.