Works of Classic Crime & Suspense Writer Cornell Woolrich Back from the Dead
Press Release November 9, 2020
Woolrich’s Literary Estate Resurrects Long-Lost Titles in New Digital and Paperback Collections
LOS ANGELES, CA, USA, November 9, 2020 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Criminal masterminds. Demented killers. Vengeful brides. The fiction of Cornell Woolrich is rife with the kind of psychological tension audiences have always craved. He has been called the foremost suspense writer of the 20th century, the Edgar Allan Poe of his era. He was a prolific writer in the crime, horror, noir, and mystery genres, publishing over two dozen novels and over two hundred short stories and novellas along with those that had been unpublished at the time of his death in 1968. He is perhaps most well-known for his wildly successful BLACK SERIES of suspense thrillers published in the 1940s, including The Bride Wore Black. “It Had to be Murder,” arguably his best short story, was adapted into the classic Alfred Hitchcock film Rear Window in 1954. Famous French film director François Truffaut directed the French new wave film La Mariee Etait en Noir based on The Bride Wore Black, which premiered in 1968, the year Woolrich died. Dozens of his short stories were adapted for popular network radio and television show episodes including Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Suspense and Molle Mystery Theatre.
With so many works published by several different publishing entities over the decades, rights to his stories were granted left and right and transferred many times over, even after his death, creating a complicated web of rights issues that has taken his Estate’s representatives years to clear up. The team at Renaissance Literary & Talent, Alan Nevins, Jacklyn Saferstein-Hansen and Lauren Boone, who represent the various parties that control the Woolrich library, have worked tirelessly to track down and retrieve rights to stories and collections that have been out of print for decades due to these rights issues. They have made a major push to reintroduce Woolrich’s revolutionary work to audiences new and old with fresh collections of his most well-known and obscure short fiction in both digital and print formats. They’ve broken ground with two collections so far: a three-part series entitled Literary Noir: A Series of Suspense, which includes some of Woolrich’s best suspense stories, and a two-part series published on the 50th anniversary his death, An Obsession with Death and Dying, with more on the way.
Literary Noir: A Series of Suspense showcases some of the finest short stories and novellas Woolrich wrote throughout his career. Some of the titles within this collection are well known amongst pulp fiction and noir fans, while others have not been published in decades. Many of these titles have been made into television shows and feature films throughout the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s, and were the inspiration for many thrillers in the following years. Volume One includes stories with protagonists desperate to solve a crime, or that have you, the reader, trying to figure out “whodunit” up until the last page. Volume Two features novellas that explore Woolrich’s rarely touched upon worlds of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. The stories in Volume Three feature characters with a simple goal: to escape imminent danger or race against the clock to save a life, at times their own.
An Obsession with Death and Dying brings together some of the most macabre short stories Woolrich ever wrote. In honor of the 50th anniversary of his death, these thrillingly gruesome tales were revived for a new generation of noir, horror, and mystery fans. Each story contains a variant of the words “death” or “dying” in their titles. The idea of death was an existential thundercloud that loomed over this tortured writer’s head, bleeding through into his writing, motivating his characters to do horrifying things. Volume One features stories that transport you to another place, dazzle you with performances or bewitch you with some wild or supernatural force. But the glitter and gold can only hide death for so long. Volume Two’s stories unleash the horror of death upon you in the most explicit ways imaginable. You will find physical grotesqueries running rampant in these stories, with dead bodies and body parts playing major roles in the movement of the plot.
Forthcoming is a three-part collection entitled Women in Noir. Woolrich produced a surprising number of stories with interesting, strong, competent female leads, some even written from a woman’s first-person point of view. These 22 short stories present some of the most unique and dynamic female characters in the crime and suspense genres.
Renaissance has also made available in digital format the six critically acclaimed novels of The Black Series, split into two volumes. Volume One contains distinct female protagonists that brave the dark worlds of Black Alibi, The Black Angel and The Bride Wore Black, while the three novels of Volume Two, The Black Curtain, The Black Path of Fear, and Rendezvous in Black, follow male protagonists.
Vibrant new life was given to all these collections, with brilliant full color covers designed by critically acclaimed illustrator Abigail Larson.
After years of painstaking efforts to track down rights and revert them back to Woolrich’s Estate, the Renaissance team, along with those publishers who appreciate the significance of his work, seek to bring his beloved stories and novels back into both the print and digital arena. In addition to Literary Noir, An Obsession with Death and Dying, and The Black Series, many of Woolrich’s individual short stories and novels are also available on digital publishing platforms. It is well past time Woolrich’s groundbreaking writing be reintroduced back into the world. It can be found on the following platforms: Amazon (Kindle), Barnes & Noble (Nook), Kobo and iBooks.
