Book Review: **Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Stories My Mother Never Told Me

Book Review

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Stories My Mother Never Told Me.

Editor, Alfred Hitchcock: numerous authors.  1963 Random House, New York

I like to read short stories, and found this book on my shelf.  I am not sure how I came to have this book.  It is actually 23 stories, two novelettes and one novel.

The stories all have an Alfred Hitchcock theme.  He was too centered on cannibalism, as three stories end in this way.  “The Wall-to-Wall Grave” was the story that left me with the strangest feeling.  This story is written by Andrew Benedict.  It portrays a father who gets even with her daughter’s lover, who had jilted her, which resulted in her suicide.  He locked him in a room with a minimal amount of dripping water, and 30 days supply of bread.  And then he just leaves him there.  It is stories like this that trigger my claustrophobia.   

Other stories of note, Ray Bradbury wrote a story about the wind, and its being out to get people.  Witch’s money by John Collier was very humorous.  In back country Spain where people aren’t familiar with checks, the still some form an artist and assume they are real money.  It creates a boom to the economy, but in the end they are not worth anything.

The Arbutus Collar by Jeremiah Digges is worthy of mention.  His philandering daughter-in-law shouldn’t have done so with the beautiful collar made for her.  He warned her it was tricky to get off; he just hadn’t mentioned it might take her head off without his help. 

One novelette was very disturbing, “The Idol of the Flies” by Jane Rice.  From the start I wanted to take the boy in the story and whack him up the side of the head with a 2x4.  I guess he got his in the end.  He would sick flies on people and lay traps for them.  He called for billions of flies to help him, but instead they smothered him. 

“Courtesy of the Road” is a story I remembered, I think from high school literature class.   It testified of the grief of a parent, and his getting even with those who had run over his little girl.

The novel, the final selection in the book, was too much for me.  I enjoyed it as I read it, but did not like the twist at the end.  I think the author must have been sick his self--  “Some of Your Blood” by Theodore Sturgeon.

Overall I would recommend these stories.  I think they are out of print, but you might find them at Deseret Industries or Ebay.