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MURDER AND ALL THAT JAZZ
by Robert J. Randisi, producer
Signet, November 2004
272 pages
$6.99
ISBN: 0451213335


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

While watching the movie Chicago (with its great score by Kander and Ebb), Robert J Randisi had the idea of gathering some short stories that are based on the red-hot world of jazz and the people who are surrounded and influenced by its energetic charms.

Most of the tales are seen from jazz musicians of differing talents -- from the royalty of the Bourbon Street singer who has a problem with the happenings surrounding the death of her husband, to the burgeoning singer who is just about to hit the big time and has to call on an old PI friend to handle her ex when he shows up to lean on her, to the competent pianist who steals more than just an extraordinary piece of music from an unknown, and unknowable street musician, to used-up has-been jazz talents who have let drugs and drink leech their talent away.

All the denizens of the jazz world show up in these pages, their stories told remarkably well by the likes of Max Allan Collins and Matthew V Clemens, Michael Connelly, Robert Ferrigno, Ed Gorman, John Harvey, Craig Holden, Laura Lippman, John Lutz, Christine Matthews, Martin Meyers, Bill Moody, Les Roberts, Peter Robinson, Julie Smith, and with one story about a long lost horn-man by the editor of the book, Robert J Randisi.

There are tales of murder, horror and tough guys, with stories that cover the waterfront from New Orleans at the beginnings of the Jazz Age rampant with prohibition and speakeasies, to the modern day New York City, with a stop in London along the way.

MURDER AND ALL THAT JAZZ is a fine collection of stories. I recommend this book to lovers of jazz and people who appreciate well written short stories. My only criticism is that I would have loved this book to have been at least twice its length.

Reviewed by Sharon Katz, November 2004

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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