CRIMES AND PUNISHMENTS: THE LOST BLOCH -- VOLUME III
By Robert Bloch
Edited by David J. Schow
Subterranean Press/ 283 pages/ $40 Signed Limited
ISBN: 1931081166
(November 2002)
(Lettered edition also available)

This is the third in a series that is republishing rare pulp Blochiana. As the title indicates, this volume focuses on Bloch's crime-oriented tales. Along with the pulp stories, the book includes the "Dr. Holmes' Murder Castle," B loch's study of Dr. H. H. Holmes. When Bloch wrote of Holmes (and even when this book was published last year), Holmes was one of America's least-known (and probably the first urban) serial killers. Well, that's all changed now with the #1 hardcover bestseller THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY: MURDER, MAGIC, AND MADNESS AT THE FAIR THAT CHANGED AMERICA by Erik Larson, but Bloch was there first. There are also some true observations of Ed Gein, the murderer who inspired Bloch to write PSYCHO. The *non*-Bloch writing here is, alone, worth the price of the book: the unexpurgated full transcription of Douglas E. Winter's 1984 interview with Bloch (published in truncated form in the award-winning FACES OF FEAR), editor Schow's exposition, and Gahan Wilson's foreword.-- Paula Guran (DarkEcho 03.20.03)

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