MobileRead February 2016 Book Club Vote

[HomeInMyShoes]

It's been on my potential read list forever, but has never quite made it over the hump. I thought this year would be it, but now I've gone and started a mystery from Australiia. What was I thinking? :P

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by HomeInMyShoes

It's been on my potential read list forever, but has never quite made it over the hump. I thought this year would be it, but now I've gone and started a mystery from Australiia. What was I thinking? :P

Well, sometimes you just have to read more than one mystery.

[HomeInMyShoes]

It's not one of my favorite genres. If it doesn't make the vote and I fear that is a very likely outcome then I might save it for a challenge next year to read something set in my home province or city.

[JSWolf]

We need three more votes for the best book in the list. Go The Blackhouse.

[WT Sharpe]

Perry Mason is such an icon, yet so very few people today have read even so much as one of the 82 books by Erle Stanley Gardner, a man who was one of the best selling writers of all times. These are thrilling mysteries, and The Case of the Velvet Claws is a wonderful start to the series, even though it has no courtroom scenes.

[JSWolf]

We need at least one more vote for The Blackhouse in order to have a 3-way tie. Two more votes would be better though. But a tie will do. So come on an vote.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

We need at least one more vote for The Blackhouse in order to have a 3-way tie. Two more votes would be better though. But a tie will do. So come on an vote.

Ive read somewhere that Raymond Burr had come in to try out for the role of Alexander Hamilton, but once Gardner saw he he said Burr was a perfect Mason. I have a biography of Raymond Burr on my TBR list (Hiding in Plain Sight: The Secret Life of Raymond Burr by Michael Seth Starr), so I'll have to read that to confirm what I just wrote, but the rest of the cast of the TV series had their own secrets, such as the year William Talman (Hamilton) disappeared from the show for a year. He'd been fired by the studio for fear his extra-curricular activities could reflect badly on his credibility as an actor playing a District Attorney when he was arrested by the police who caught him naked at a pot party. He was eventually rehired.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Could be. The Case of the Velvet Claws is only $5.99 at Amazon.

Brat Farrar by Josephine Tey is $11.99.

You're looking at the wrong version. I see Brat Farrar for $2.99

However, that being said, I will happily read either for this month's book.

[pdurrant]

There is very nearly a five-way tie!

[HomeInMyShoes]

Only seven more votes for Canada and it could be six-way.

Just saying.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by CRussel

You're looking at the wrong version. I see Brat Farrar for $2.99

I think this must be a bootleg version. I wouldn't ever pay money to a bootlegger.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by CRussel

You're looking at the wrong version. I see Brat Farrar for $2.99

However, that being said, I will happily read either for this month's book.

You're tight. I mistakenly quoted the price of the hardcover. The Kindle version of Brat Farrar's Josephine Tey is indeed $2.99.

Sorry.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

You're tight. I mistakenly quoted the price of the hardcover. The Kindle version of Brat Farrar's Josephine Tey is indeed $2.99.

Sorry.

No, you were right the first time. This is the legitimate version of Brat Farrar, published by Simon & Schuster. The other is almost certainly a bootleg copy. I think those who sell the copyrights of others are scum; it's even worse than the darkside or a virtual trip to Canada.

[WT Sharpe]

From the "About the Author" section from The Case of the Haunted Husband (Perry Mason Series Book 18):

Erle Stanley Gardner (1889-1970) is a prolific American author best known for his works centered on the lawyer-detective Perry Mason. At the time of his death in March of 1970, in Ventura, California, Gardner was “the most widely read of all American writers” and “the most widely translated author in the world,” according to social historian Russell Nye. He was cited by the Guinness Book of World Records as the #1 Bestselling Writer of All Time. The first Perry Mason novel, The Case of The Velvet Claws, published in 1933, sold twenty-eight million copies in its first fifteen years. In the mid-1950s, the Perry Mason novels were selling at the rate of 20,000 copies a day. There have been six motion pictures based on his work and the hugely popular “Perry Mason” television series starring Raymond Burr, which aired for nine years and 271 episodes.

[WT Sharpe]

Here's a little taste of how Mason routinely and expertly slid out of choke holds. In The Case of the Haunted Husband, Lt. Tragg thought he'd had something on Mason for certain this time. The feather he'd spotted on the floor in Mason's office was evidence Mason had been at the scene of a locked down crime scene. WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS indicating the murderer ahead. Don't read if you intend to read the book or see the TV episode:

Spoiler:

From the book (1941):

"When did you first know, Mason?" Tragg asked.
Mason said, "I should have known some time before I did, but when you found that white feather in my hallway, Tragg, I realized at once what had happened. When Mrs. Greeley telephoned about the shirt she wasn't calling from her house. She was telephoning from the Adirondack Hotel or someplace nearby, but said she was at home so that she would have an alibi."
"And she had already committed the murder?"
"Yes. She had followed Tanner ever since he left the courtroom. By that time she was desperate. She had tried to protect Homan and herself and she was going to see it through. She realized Tanner held the whip hand. Remember, when she called she said she couldn't leave right away, so she had time to dash by and pick up the shirt and tuxedo. You should have known as soon as you found that feather, Tragg."
"You mean she was the one who dropped the feather?"
"Of course," Mason said.
"How did you know you didn't?" Tragg asked.
Mason grinned. "I wouldn't want to make any admissions to you in your official capacity, Tragg, but if I had been in that room in the Adirondack Hotel, I certainly hope you don't think I could be so confoundedly negligent as not to look over my shoes very carefully while I was returning to the office in the taxicab. A man of ordinary intelligence would know that loose feathers would stick to wet shoes – and take proper precautions."
And Mason gently slid the receiver onto its hook before Tragg could make any reply — or ask any questions.

From the TV show adaptation (1958):

TRAGG: I can't get over it. Do you realize that when Mrs. Greeley phoned you, saying that she found that shirt, she'd already killed Tanner?
MASON: Of course. She probably called me from the ladies' room at the Adirondack Hotel.
TRAGG: And you thought Heywood killed Tanner to cover up that affair. Lucky for your client that Mrs.
Greeley confessed.
STREET: You're wrong, lieutenant. Perry kept waiting for Burger to introduce the shirt and when he didn't, we knew it wasn't Greeley's.
TRAGG: Oh, so you guessed it was Heywood's shirt?
MASON: Well, sort of.
TRAGG: That's what I said, you were lucky. Lucky that Mrs. Greeley confessed. There was no possible way that you could peg her as the killer.
MASON: How long have we known each other?
TRAGG: Long enough.
MASON: And during that time you've called me everything under the sun.
TRAGG: That still goes. For my dough, you're unscrupulous, - conniving, unprincipled --
MASON: And what about stupid?
TRAGG: No, stupid you're not.
MASON: Well, if I were in a room with a murdered man and I did not check my wet shoes to see if I were tracking feathers back to my office, - what would you call me?
TRAGG; Stupid. Well, who else could have done it? There was only you, me, Mrs. Greeley, and -- Oy gevalt.
MASON: After you, lieutenant.