It’s not as if we needed O.J. in order to detect the connection between crime and entertainment. Lest we forget, though, we still have Jerry Springer, Cops, Amy Fisher, Robert Blake, all those rotten child stars, Allen Iverson, Bum Fights, and now, heinous summer kidnappings. But the glass shield of television tends to repel lasting significance. Other people’s dark days are wiped away by the media’s intermittent blades as if they were dead bugs.

Enter Otto Penzler and Thomas Cook, editors of a debut anthology series that seeks to restore our sense of outrage, and empathy. " Crime reporting begins with Cain’s response to humanity’s first interrogation, " they write in the collection’s foreword. " The question that Cain poses — ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ — chillingly reveals the murderer in all his unrepentant malice. "

We’ve been trespassing against our neighbors ever since. The most successful essays here do not dwell on the lurid details of the crime, or the modern environment and its methods; instead they linger inside the perpetrator’s head, turning over the rotten logs of motivation, exposing the dank, multi-hearted worms: greed, power, lust, envy, fear.

Penzler is an editor and bookshop proprietor; Cook is the author of 18 books, including several true-crime volumes. Aiming to honor what they consider an overlooked genre, the pair culled numerous periodicals, large and small. The representatives here are mostly heavy hitters — the New Yorker, Esquire, GQ, Vanity Fair. The better pieces — Doug Most’s stunning Boston Magazine portrait of what haunts a parole hopeful; Skip Hollandsworth’s gritty Texas Monthly look at the likely murder of Calumet Farms stud star Alydar — underscore the home-turf advantage of local reporters. Moreover, reading these stories naked — bereft of glossy pages, crime-scene photos, salacious pullquotes, and, in some cases, whiffs of perfume — levels the journalistic playing field in a revealing way.

Among the anthology’s subjects are murderous football players, a death-row inmate, a flawed DEA agent, corrupt cops, a greedy racing-stable owner, a family man with dark appetites, a conflicted child killer, an Ecstasy kingpin, and terrorists. Also offered up are pieces focused on crime’s aftermath: the jury room, the fallibility of eyewitness testimony, the international investigation of an air crash.

Notwithstanding that the writers are mostly male (only two women are represented), the standout piece comes from Time’s Nancy Gibbs. Although not a crime story in the traditional sense, " The Day of the Attack " is a wrenching, poetic, almost symphonic account of the September 11 atrocities that still reads fresh despite the countless column inches since logged. After American Airlines Flight 11 hit the north WTC tower, she describes how " the gruesome rains came — bits of plane, a tire, office furniture, glass, a hand, a leg, whole bodies . . .  " After United Flight 175 hit the south WTC tower, she writes, " the air smelled of smoke and concrete, that smell that spits out of jackhammers chewing up pavement. " She tells us that as the firefighters climbed the stairs, " the steel moaned and the cracks spread in zippers through the walls. "

As wonderful as this piece is, however, I worry that the tribute-minded editors may have undermined the meat-and-potato fare of stories about lone, lusty killers by seeking broader appeal. True-crime buffs may also be disappointed by stories about the motivations of an Eliot Ness–style lawman, the animosity between cock fighters and animal-rights advocates, and O.J.’s new lawyer.

That said, each piece here ranks as first-rate journalism. The prose styles are varied and distinct, sporting an almost hardboiled cheek that sets them apart from their journalistic brethren. Spin correspondent E. Jean Carroll compares life in the cloudy town of Dryden, New York, to " living in an old lady’s underwear drawer. " Hollandsworth describes his bullish criminal suspect, Calumet Farm manager J.T. Lundy, as having " a head the size of a gasoline can and a nose that looked as if it had been busted and reset by a plumber. "

At the end of each essay, the author reflects on the journalistic challenges that were involved and gives updates on the main players. These nuggets tend to be quick and brief, leaving you wanting more. In the end, though, readers should relish this homage, a compelling effort to lift crime writing to a shelf with a little more sunlight.