The new Perry Mason murder mystery has...terrible pace......stirring court-room drams......a duck that can’t swims...John L. Witherspoon was accustomed to having — and paying — his way. There was a definite reason why he didn’t approve his daughter Lois’ love affair, and he hired Perry Mason to break it up. If Mason would investigate an 18-year-old murder, Witherspoon was sure the results would change his daughter’s mind.Perry took the job because several things about the old case intrigued him. And because he had a hunch that the answer to it might save Lois’ happiness.Mason, Delia Street and Paul Drake went to El Templo, Witherspoon’s great California ranch; they went into action at once, and soon they smoked out a string of crooked plots, brought several shadowy figures into too strong a light, and ran plump into murder-up-to-date with Mason caught in the middle.

The receptionist told Perry Mason there were two men waiting in the outer office; one of them looked like a prosperous banker, the other a tramp. One wanted to see him about some corporation law, and the other had a damage claim. So Mason said, “I’ll see the tramp. Tell the banker I can’t be bothered with corporation law.”But it turned out it was the tramp who wanted to sec him about corporation law. And that, in turn, merged into the story of one of the famous Lost Mines of the desert region of Southern California; of a sinewy little desert prospector and his partner, who had struck it rich, “housed-up” and, losing his health, had forsaken the big red-tiled mansion in the fashionable district of San Roberto to spread his sleeping bag out in the cactus garden at the far corner of the grounds. And finally there was the mysterious drowsy mosquito — was it a harbinger of death?These characters, together with the lure of a fabulously rich gold deposit, discovered more than half a century ago, then lost, and lying untouched year after year, waiting only for chance and the ingenuity of Perry Mason to bring it back into the limelight, make for a fast moving, baffling Perry Mason yarn.

A bright, shiny tin can in a dark, cobwebby corner of the cellar preserve shelf — unlabelled and empty!Mrs. Gentrie, the meticulous hose-wife, was annoyed but not too upset. Her sister-in-law Rebecca was exited and suspicious. Delman Steele, their new young boarder, was quietly interested...Then things began to happen. A man and his housekeeper were found missing from the house next door. Willful old Elston Karr, who used to run guns up the Yangtze and was now confined to a Wheel-chair in the flat above the missing man’s apartment, retained Mason to protect him from — well, Mason wasn’t quite sure himself. But his mind began to work fast.Then Mason heard about the empty tin can. It interested him — a lot.All our old friends are here, Della Street, Paul Drake, Lieutenant Tragg, in a mystery so fast and exiting that it has been called “even better than Gardner.”

Don’t look now — but there’s a mystery behind those funs. And there’s a horse behind that mystery... Take it from PERRY MASON and DELLA STREET, you’re about to witness the finest display of legal fireworks of the year — with Perry an accomplice in murder.It all starts quietly enough — with two cars side-swiping each other in the middle of the desert. And in the trunk of one of them, an indent jalopy, Perry Mason finds a fan-dancer’s wardrobe. (Item: 2 fans; Item: 1 pair of dancing shoes).The fans lead to one of the most beautiful clients Perry Mason has ever had... and to a body. A body on the end of a Japanese sword...They also lead to a beautiful mental teaser for you, with Gardner dropping his clues as fast as you can pick them — or his book — up. Here it is, a real legal twister!

Goldfish — a golddigger — and a valuable secret formula net Perry Mason the most baffling case of his career — and he nearly gets caught on his own hook...Humorless Harrington Faulkner was fit to be tied. That golddigger was making preposterous demands — but if he didn’t pay, his goldfish would die. And they were special goldfish — he’d developed the strain himself — Veil Tail Moor Telescopes, they were, the ‘fish of death’...Perry Mason thought he was a crank with a taller fish story than usual.And then the fish disappeared and a body was found on the bathroom floor — beside a shattered goldfish bowl...From then on Della Street and Perry Mason are in the case up to their necks, along with:SALLY MADISON: a beautiful girl with model proportions, definitely not as good as gold...TOM GRIDLEY: a chemist and an idealist — the inventor of formulas and trouble for Sally...JANE FAULKNER: the second Mrs. Faulkner, who turns out to be not as dumb as she looks...ELMER CARSON: cagey co-owner of Faulkner’s business with a proprietary interest in other things...GENEVIEVE FAULKNER: the first Mrs. Faulkner and the reason Harrington Faulkner was afraid of divorces...WILFRED DIXON: her business counsellor who knew how to bluff but didn’t like to be called...JAMES STAUNTON: a gentleman who underwrites more than insurance...

This sparkling mystery novel reveals a sensational new discovery in the field of scientific criminal investigation...It all began with an auction. If Perry Mason hadn’t made a casual, five-dollar bid he wouldn’t have bought the personal effects of Helen Cadmus, missing secretary presumed a suicide...If the personal effects hadn’t turned out to be diaries and a photograph album, Benjamin Addicks wouldn’t have come into the picture...If Benjamin Addicks hadn’t been an eccentric millionaire, he wouldn’t have been conducting psychological experiments on gorillas...And that brings us to the most spine-chilling scene ever encountered in a Gardner mystery: Perry Mason creeping through a silent house, stalked by A MURDEROUS, GRINNING GORILLA!

A shot...A splash...A shout...and Perry Mason finds himself treading the deepest water of his career. This time, he nearly goes wider...Things were tense aboard Parker Benton’s yacht. About the only thing the group had in common was the bad weather and a highly controversial business proposition. When that subject came up, tempers came out — and in no time at all the spine-chilling cry “Man O-ver-boar-r-d” cut through the fog...

It started as the case of the disappearing driver. Stephane Olger was hitchhiking to Los Angeles when the accident happened. When it was over she was found unconscious behind the wheel — alone. There was a manslaughter charge against her...

When a murdered man is found in the home of shady insurance adjuster Walter Prescott, a simple divorce case turns into a courtroom puzzler, as Perry Mason follows the clues to catch a killer.

Perry Mason is presented with a strange bag of tricks in THE CASE OF THE MISCHIEVOUS DOLL.Dorrie Ambler was a beauty. She also proved to be one of the most startling clients in Mason’s career — she insisted that he carefully inspect her appendectomy scar.Perry thought this sort of thing was much more in Paul Drake’s line — and indeed, Paul was delighted to oblige...But later, when Dorrie proceeded to make history — and the headlines — at the International Airport, both Mason and Drake realized that any future scars would he theirs battle stars, inflicted by Lt. Tragg and Hamilton Berger...

Perry Mason, world-famous lawyer and sleuth, keeps a lady in mink under wraps in...Perry Mason and Della Street were in the middle of a rare steak when the mink coat appeared in the hands of a puzzled restaurant proprietor.The coat belonged, he said, to a waitress who had just taken it on the him... and he didn’t mean food. Now what to do with the coat?Perry Mason examined the mink he decided there was more than a moth-eaten patch to meet the eye — particularly when the cops arrived...

A dazzling new Perry Mason mystery in which a black eye, a bewildered cabby, a pile of junk and a body beautiful add up to one of the most intricate puzzles of Mason’s career.It started with a body. The body was alive, female, seductive, and Mrs. Sybil Harlan was convinced that it was taking her husband right out from under her eyes.Mason is in rare form as he tackles one of the most obscure and tantalizing courtroom problems he has ever faced.

An exceedingly profane green parrot, with wicked glittering eyes and a genius for saying the wrong thing...A pretty (if rather prim) young librarian with a curious interest in dangerous weapons...An eccentric multi-millionaire, with a penchant for books, trailers and birds...An apparently un-traceable murder, committed with a double-barreled derringer, obsolete in design but deadly in efficiency... These, and some other bizarre details, which we won’t reveal, plunge Perry Mason and Della Street up to their necks in one of the most exciting mysteries that Erie Stanley Gardner has ever written!

Horace Warren pays five hundred dollars to have Perry Mason attend a buffet dinner to observe his guests. He also wants Mason to investigate a fingerprint and suspects his wife is being blackmailed. Mrs Warren's mysterious past may hold the clues.

The last of the Perry Mason mysteries features the headlong pace, wealth of red herrings, and sizzling courtroom scene characterizing the best of Gardner.There was something phony about the girl her cheap coat didn’t go with her smartly tailored suit, her hair-do didn’t go with her beautifully kept hands — and her face didn’t go with her story.It didn’t take Mason long to figure out that this so-called Sylvia Farr was no poor little girl from the country in search of her missing sister, but was indeed sister Mae herself — a girl in trouble of some sort, deep trouble.So Perry went to bat and soon found himself in a hot ball game — one called murder.

The client had an extraordinary air of assurance about her — one could almost say a queenly air.There was no doubt that she was in some sort of jam, which had started years before when she had won a beauty contest. The question was, why was she trying to hide what had happened since — and who was trying to expose it?Perry Mason was intrigued, and soon found himself unraveling a past that led straight to a trial for murder.Erle Stanley Gardner is the world’s best-selling mystery writer for reasons this fast-paced story makes abundantly clear.

Here’s a PERRY MASON story, with a murder hinging on as ingenious a trick as has appeared in a mystery in a long time, and containing some of the most exiting courtroom scenes Erle Stanley Gardner has even written.It’s about:Alden E. Leeds, millionaire and black sheep of the family, about to the torn limb from limb by a pack of gold-greedy relatives; Phyllis, old man Leeds’s niece and business manager; Ned Barkler, once his partner in Klondike days; L. C. Conway, who sold dice almost anyone could roll; blonde, hard Marcia Whittaker, who seemed to have said that all she wanted was a cozy little home; and, of course, wily Perry Mason, Della Street, his secretary, and lanky Paul Drake, the detective.Readers will find here the usual swift pace and ingenuity, the unexpected twists and surprises that have made Erle Stanley Gardner the most popular detective-store writer in America.

It all began enough when, to get out of a shower, Della — Perry Mason’s “girl Friday” — dragger the lawyer-sleuth into a department store restaurant for tea.That was where they first saw Mrs. Sarah Breel and her niece, Virginia Trent. They where in a spot too, with the store detective on Mrs. Breel’s trail, and even Virginia admitting her aunt was a kleptomaniac. It all seemed so strange, naturally Mason got interested. And Della Street, trained by years of experience to read the how’s moods, realized he didn’t go far just on theory... that if he appeared to see more than met the eye, his perception was based on scene point in practical psychology.From this odd beginning, the vagaries of a whimsical fate catapult Perry mason into the case of the missing diamonds, the homey woman who didn’t look like a shoplifter, the methodical drunk, the thick reddish stain on a woman’s kid shoe, and beautiful Lone Bedford. No one knew much about her, but all the men wanted to know more — including Perry Mason!