From Perry Mason-creator Erle Stanley Gardner comes a lost classic of detective fiction featuring private eyes Donald Lam (once played by Frank Sinatra!) and Bertha Cool. Cool & Lam are back, in the case Raymond Chandler called "about the best of the series since the first two...perhaps since the very first." Hired to prevent a poisoning that hasn't happened yet, Donald Lam tries playing mind games with a prospective killer, only to wind up with two poisonings to solve - and two dangerous femme fatales, not to mention an adulterous dentist, a questionable real estate scheme, and a scientific system for betting the horses that someone might kill to keep secret...

A runaway witness leads a lawyer into a whodunit: "The only dull pages in this book are the blank ones" (The New York Times). Defense lawyer Perry Mason is surprised to receive two checks from a stranger named Lola Allred. And when he speaks with Lola's husband, he discovers the woman has run off with her daughter's boyfriend-who happens to be an important witness in a lawsuit. Soon Mason's caught up in a complicated case involving not only a missing witness but forgery and murder as well . . . This mystery is part of Edgar Award-winning author Erle Stanley Gardner's classic, long-running Perry Mason series, which has sold three hundred million copies and serves as the inspiration for the HBO show starring Matthew Rhys and Tatiana Maslany. DON'T MISS THE NEW HBO ORIGINAL SERIES PERRY MASON, BASED ON CHARACTERS FROM ERLE STANLEY GARDNER'S NOVELS, STARRING EMMY AWARD WINNER MATTHEW RHYS

From Perry Mason creator Erle Stanley Gardner - during his life, the best-selling American author of all time -- comes a lost classic of detective fiction featuring private eyes Donald Lam (once played by Frank Sinatra!) and Bertha Cool. Has Donald Lam gone to the dark side? From the world-famous creator of "Perry Mason," Erle Stanley Gardner - at his death the best-selling American writer of all time - comes another baffling case for the Cool & Lam detective agency: SHILLS CAN'T CASH CHIPS. Return to the 1960s as a simple insurance investigation into a car accident puts Bertha Cool and Donald Lam on the trail of murder - and Donald hip-deep in danger when he poses as an ex-con to infiltrate a criminal gang. It's Gardner's twistiest caper ever, and a fitting capper to Hard Case Crime's revival of this classic (and long unavailable) detective series.

'For fans of classic hard-boiled whodunits, this is a time machine back to an exuberant era of snappy patter, stakeouts, and double-crosses' LA Times 'Kingpin among the mystery writers' New York Times Muriell Gilman left her father at the breakfast table while she cooked seconds of sausage and eggs. When she returned, he had disappeared. She searched the house from cellar to attic. Then she went out to the workshop . . . there, scattered on the floor, were hundred-dollar bills, an overturned chair, and a spreading, crimson stain. That's when she telephoned Perry Mason. Perry Mason has so many questions: why did she call him? Why didn't she want her step-sister to talk to him? And why was Gillman's wife being blackmailed - by a female private investigator . . . ?

At the time of his death, Erle Stanley Gardner was the best-selling American author of the 20th century, and world famous as the creator of crusading attorney Perry Mason. Gardner also created the hardboiled detective team of Cool and Lam, stars of 29 novels published between 1939 and 1970 -- and one that's never been published until now.Lost for more than 75 years, THE KNIFE SLIPPED was meant to be the second book in the series but shelved when Gardner's publisher objected to (among other things) Bertha Cool's tendency to "talk tough, swear, smoke cigarettes, and try to gyp people." But this tale of adultery and corruption, of double-crosses and triple identities -- however shocking for 1939 -- shines today as a glorious present from the past, a return to the heyday of private eyes and shady dames, of powerful criminals, crooked cops, blazing dialogue, and delicious plot twists.

Erle Stanley Gardner was not just the creator of PERRY MASON - at the time of his death, he was the best-selling American author of all time, with hundreds of millions of books in print, including the 29 cases of the brash, irresistible detective team of Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. Gardner was also one of the most ingenious plot-spinners in the field, coming up with stunning twists and reveals... and THE COUNT OF 9 is Gardner at his twistiest. Hired to protect the treasures of a globe-trotting adventurer, Bertha and Donald confront an impossible crime: how could anything be smuggled out of a dinner party - least of all a 6-foot-long blowgun - when the guests were X-rayed coming and going? But that's nothing compared to the crime they face next: AN IMPOSSIBLE MURDER...

Dealing with debtors turns deadly for a prickly PI in this hard-boiled mystery by the creator of Perry Mason and author of Bats Fly at Dusk. A hot-headed widow and a glass-jawed ex-lawyer, Bertha Cool and Donald Lam seem like an unlikely duo of private detectives. Even so, they've managed to solve the most difficult of mysteries--when they're together. With Donald now on a European vacation, Bertha is hesitant to accept any new business--but money is money, and this new case seems routine enough . . . Bertha is hired to get sales engineer Everett Belder out of a $20,000 problem. Unfortunately, his troubles soon multiply. His wife is receiving poisoned-pen letters accusing him of infidelity. Then she disappears. And there's also the matter of the body in his cellar. With everything spiraling out of control, Bertha must determine who is behind this deadly game of cat and mouse before another murder comes into play. "No one has ever matched Gardner for swift, sure exposition." --Kirkus Reviews "The best American writer, of course, is Erle Stanley Gardner." --Evelyn Waugh

Following a money trail leads a PI into danger in this hard-boiled mystery by the creator of Perry Mason and author of Turn on the Heat. Brainy private detective Donald Lam is always one step ahead of the bad guys--but he's also smaller than them and typically gets beat up. That's why his boss, the ever-irascible Bertha Cool, has hired a martial arts master to teach him self-defense. The first class isn't easy for Donald, but he is rewarded with a new client . . . Henry Ashbury is concerned about his daughter's recent spending habits. He wants Donald to find out where her money is going, without letting on that he's a detective. So, going undercover as Ashbury's trainer, Donald soon learns the story behind the daughter's finances. But when his investigation also turns up a dead body, the diminutive detective must teach the killer a lesson in justice . . . "Lively wit and machinegun dialogue." --Ralph E. Vaughan, author of Murder in the Goblins' Playground "Gardner has a way of moving the story forward that is almost a lost art: great stretches of dialogue alternate with lively chunks of exposition, and the two work together perfectly, without sacrificing momentum." --Booklist

This is a new release of the original 1950 edition.

This is a new release of the original 1959 edition.

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

From the world-famous creator of "Perry Mason," Erle Stanley Gardner - at his death the best-selling American writer of all time - comes another baffling case for the Cool & Lam detective agency: TURN ON THE HEAT. Return to the sizzling 1940s as Bertha Cool and Donald Lam investigate a missing woman, a desperate husband, a politician with a past, and a femme fatale with a future...assuming she doesn't go to jail for murder! Featuring brand new cover art that is a posthumous collaboration between Laurel Blechman and the legendary Robert Maguire - the first new Maguire cover in decades!