I read this book for the Vintage Mystery Bingo Reading Challenge 2014.
The challenge is to read 6 or more Vintage Mysteries. All novels must have been
originally written before 1960 and be from the mystery category.
I read this for E-5: Read a Book with a Detective Team.
Few beat the team of Perry, Della, and Paul.
The Case of the Calendar
Girl – Erle Stanley Gardner
The 57th Perry Mason novel begins by introducing us readers
to George Ansley, an honest contractor. George feels lowdown at having to bribe
influence peddler and extortionist Meredith Borden to call off building
inspectors that are giving George’s crews a hard time. Distracted, George is
involved a car accident. The gorgeous driver of the other car persuades him to
drive her home, despite possible injuries. The beguiling beauty sidetracks him
even more by smiling, acting fragile and helpless, showing extreme legginess
and, most diverting of all, kissing him.
After beauty’s adverse effects on his better judgment wear
off, he begins to fear that he's taken a legal misstep. The same night night Honest George consults
Perry Mason, buttonholing him and Della Street in a restaurant. Mason wants to
examine the accident scene, so they return to Borden’s estate. They get scared
off by savage watchdogs and barbed wire catches threads from their clothes. As
it turns out, Borden is killed about this time and the police are combing the
city for witnesses and suspects. In efforts to save George from the gas chamber,
Mason tracks down a couple of calendar girls – women who pose for amateur and
professional photographers for ads and “art photography.”
To my mind, late Masons, say from 1958 through the Sixties,
are readable but just okay. The reader has qualms. For instance, in this one,
no question is raised whether or not the murder gun had fingerprints on it.
Although it provides rather an interesting twist, it also seems far-fetched
when Mason saves a client by throwing a party to the wolves and then takes the
thrown one on as his client.
Despite the fact that Gardner’s narrative pyrotechnics
always overshadowed fair play, usually we readers can forgive Mason sitting on
evidence and not giving us a chance to figure the case out. In this one, the
lack of fair play is harder to forgive since there is more explaining and
reported speech than showing us action. Gardner’s usual narrative magic droops
and it’s mildly disappointing
After 56 Mason novels, we can’t blame Gardner for trying new
gimmicks, for the sake of his own sanity and ours. In this one, I don’t think
the tricks and devices worked as well as they did in other late Fifties outings
such as Gilded Lily (1956), Lucky Loser (1957), Daring Decoy (1957), Foot-Loose Doll (1958), and Long-Legged Models (1958).
Most of my Mason experience has been with earlier books. I haven't read any later than 1952...I'll have to keep your review in mind when I move on to the later ones.
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