The Case of the Lucky Legs (Perry Mason) by Erle Stanley Gardner

Marjorie Clune is one lucky lady. Or so she thinks. She’s won a contest that has judged her legs to be the “best in show” and now she’s set upon a fine modeling and movie career. Unfortunately, it doesn’t play out that way due to the shenanigans of movie promoter Frank Patton who turns out to be a con man. Famous lawyer Perry Mason is hired to defend Marjorie, a job which gets much more difficult when he decides to visit Patton in his apartment and discovers his dead body.

This is the fifth Perry Mason novel I’ve read so I am by no means an expert considering there were 82 novels and 4 short stories penned by Mr. Gardner. However, I’ve sampled them throughout the series and it now seems evident that Perry Mason evolved quite a bit throughout the run. This is only the third novel published and, like the first two (which I also read), it depicts a much harder Perry Mason than the character we usually think of. He is a forceful and direct man, given to barking orders to everybody around him and expecting instant compliance. Even his utterly loyal secretary, Della Street, isn’t immune to his commanding nature. Often, soon after issuing a curt command to an associate, he follows up with “And make it snappy!”

This behavior can be a little off-putting for those who come to these novels only after absorbing the TV series starring Raymond Burr. However, it is consistent with the times in which they were written and with other series characters being published. He absolutely matches his own description as described in the very first book, "The Case of the Velvet Claws": “You'll find that I'm a lawyer who has specialized in trial work, and in a lot of criminal work...I'm a specialist on getting people out of trouble. They come to me when they're in all sorts of trouble, and I work them out.” In this novel he proves his mettle and even risks putting himself in severe legal peril. If his hunch is wrong he will be indicted for accessory after the fact…for murder.

But one thing does certainly remain consistent throughout the long run of the series: Perry Mason’s unerring ability to get to the heart of the crime, no matter how convoluted the scheme. These early books in the series don’t even include a courtroom scene. The case never gets that far. Perry acts more like a ferocious PI than a lawyer but his profound understanding of the law (thanks to the author’s extensive experience with more than 20 years as a practicing attorney) gives him a leg up on other PIs and police.

I enjoyed this one just fine, but I am hoping for the more traditional Perry Mason novels in my future reading. The best ones always include exposing the truth through piercing cross-examination on the witness stand after all seems lost. While this one didn’t include such a scene, the reveal of whodunnit at the end was expertly crafted and as fulfilling as I’d hoped for.

The Case of the Sulky Girl (Perry Mason) by Erle Stanley Gardner

The second of the Perry Mason novels is the first to take on the familiar traditional approach of having lengthy courtroom scenes dominate the end of the book. An enjoyable plot revolving around Perry's client, a young woman who is accused of murdering her Uncle in order to get her full inheritance.

I really enjoyed the way Erle Stanley Gardner combines two major mystery elements here.  The first is the expected mystery of whodunit. But the second, more subtle mystery involves Perry Mason's courtroom tactics and trying to figure out how he is going to turn the tables on the huge pile of evidence against his client. Cleverly done, of course.

Looking forward to more of this series.

The Case of the Velvet Claws (Perry Mason) by Erle Stanley Gardner

When a self-absorbed woman named “Eva Griffin” comes to Perry Mason claiming her powerful

husband is blackmailing her, Perry’s intrepid secretary Della Street doesn’t trust her. That’s our first clue that neither should we. Later, when Eva overhears her husband arguing with a man just before being shot, she claims it was Perry’s voice she heard arguing with the murdered man. A trustworthy client she is not!  But in true Perry Mason style, he vows to fight for his client no matter the cost.

This is the very first Perry Mason novel, originally published in 1933.  The Perry Mason series consists of over 80 novels and is currently the number 3 all-time best-selling fiction series, following only “Harry Potter” and R.L. Stine’s “Goosebumps”.  I thought it about time I sampled one.

Before reading this book, I knew very little about Perry Mason and have never seen the TV series starring Raymond Burr.  As an attorney who takes on clients in trouble, he works diligently to gather all relevant facts using his own considerable powers of observation and intellect as well as hiring private detective Paul Drake to work on his behalf.  While later books will include dramatic courtroom scenes, this first book does not but instead follows a more traditional detective novel format, albeit with some nice plot twists thrown in.

To be honest, I was somewhat surprised at the character of Perry Mason.  He has no qualms about bending and even breaking the law as long as it leads to helping his client.  He will lie about what evidence he has in order to trick somebody into revealing more than they should.  He will intercept personal mail and even a legal summons, read it and then use it to trap people into confessions.  In fact, a large part of his technique, at least in this first novel, is to set up elaborate false situations to trick people into telling him what they know. But because he is a lawyer, he knows just what he can get away with and he deftly pulls out the legal buzz words to impress the right people at the right time.

Overall, I enjoyed this book even more than I thought I would. The plot was nicely complex with several surprising twists, but it was fairly easy to keep track of who’s who and follow Perry’s thought process as he went.  Looking forward to reading more of this series as well as sampling Gardner's other work.