We begin to fear for Fortunato, dressed as a fool and behaving like one. We descend with this pair from the street, where the carnival season is in full swing, down into the catacombs beneath the Montresor palazzo. Every step inexorably takes us away from the excesses and frivolity of the celebrations above-down into a dark and chill place, where even the bells on a fool’s cap become fuelfor nightmares. We may have seen more graphically violent representations of the mind of a killer in fiction, but Montresor, capable of mocking both his victim’s prayers and his screams, is as heartless as any.

With the power of a conjurer, Poe knew exactly how to summon our fears. Read “The Cask of Amontillado.” Then feel free to sleep with the light on and the bedroom door open.


***

Jan Burke is the Edgar-winning author of twelve novels, including Bones, Flight, Bloodlines, and Kidnapped. Her newest is a supernatural thriller, The Messenger. She is currently at work on the next Irene Kelly novel.

The Curse of Amontillado BY LAWRENCE BLOCK

I knew I wanted an Edgar Award back in 1961, when my good friend Don Westlake failed to win one.

He’d just published The Mercenaries, and it was nominated for an Edgar for Best First Mystery. Someone else took home the statuette (for what was in fact a first mystery by a veteran science-fiction writer, which made it eligible under the letter if not the spirit of the rule), and we all assured Don that it was honor enough to be nominated, and he pretended to believe us. We don’t need to feel sorry for the man, though; he has a whole shelf full of those porcelain busts now, plus a sheaf of nominations. Anyway, this isn’t about him.

It’s about me.

I began publishing paperback original crime novels in 1961 and hardcovers a few years later.



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