Erle Stanley Gardner Books In Order
Book links take you to Amazon. As an Amazon Associate I earn money from qualifying purchases.Publication Order of Perry Mason Books
The Case of the Velvet Claws | (1933) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Sulky Girl | (1933) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Lucky Legs | (1934) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Howling Dog | (1934) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Curious Bride | (1934) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Counterfeit Eye | (1935) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Caretaker's Cat | (1935) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Sleepwalker's Niece | (1936) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Stuttering Bishop | (1936) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Dangerous Dowager | (1937) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Lame Canary | (1937) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Substitute Face | (1938) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe | (1938) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Perjured Parrot | (1939) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Rolling Bones | (1939) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Baited Hook | (1940) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Silent Partner | (1940) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Haunted Husband | (1941) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Empty Tin | (1941) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Drowning Duck | (1942) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Careless Kitten | (1942) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Buried Clock | (1943) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Drowsy Mosquito | (1943) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Crooked Candle | (1944) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Black-Eyed Blonde | (1944) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Golddigger's Purse | (1945) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Half-Wakened Wife | (1945) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Borrowed Brunette | (1946) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Fan-Dancer's Horse | (1946) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Lazy Lover | (1947) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Lonely Heiress | (1948) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Vagabond Virgin | (1948) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Cautious Coquette | (1949) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Dubious Bridegroom | (1949) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Negligent Nymph | (1950) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the One-Eyed Witness | (1950) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Fiery Fingers | (1951) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Angry Mourner | (1951) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Moth-Eaten Mink | (1952) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Grinning Gorilla | (1952) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Hesitant Hostess | (1953) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Green-Eyed Sister | (1953) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Fugitive Nurse | (1954) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Runaway Corpse | (1954) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Restless Redhead | (1954) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Sun Bather's Diary | (1955) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Glamorous Ghost | (1955) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Nervous Accomplice | (1955) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Terrified Typist | (1955) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Gilded Lily | (1956) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Demure Defendant | (1956) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of The Screaming Woman | (1957) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Lucky Loser | (1957) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Daring Decoy | (1957) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Foot-Loose Doll | (1958) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Long-Legged Models | (1958) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Calendar Girl | (1958) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Singing Skirt | (1959) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Mythical Monkeys | (1959) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Deadly Toy | (1959) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Waylaid Wolf | (1960) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Duplicate Daughter | (1960) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Shapely Shadow | (1960) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Spurious Spinster | (1961) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Bigamous Spouse | (1961) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Reluctant Model | (1962) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Blonde Bonanza | (1962) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Ice-Cold Hands | (1962) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Mischievous Doll | (1962) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Stepdaughter's Secret | (1963) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Amorous Aunt | (1963) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Daring Divorcee | (1964) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Phantom Fortune | (1964) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Horrified Heirs | (1964) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Troubled Trustee | (1965) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Beautiful Beggar | (1965) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Worried Waitress | (1966) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Queenly Contestant | (1967) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Careless Cupid | (1968) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Fabulous Fake | (1969) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Fenced-in Woman | (1972) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Postponed Murder | (1973) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of Too Many Murders | (1989) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Burning Bequest | (1990) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Perry Mason Collections
The Case of the Murderer's Bride and Other Stories | (1955) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Crimson Kiss | (1970) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case Of The Crying Swallow | (1971) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Irate Witness and Other Stories | (1973) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Four Cases of Murder | (1989) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Doug Selby Books
The D.A. Calls It Murder | (1937) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Holds a Candle | (1938) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Draws a Circle | (1939) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Goes to Trial | (1940) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D. A. Cooks a Goose | (1942) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Calls a Turn | (1944) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Breaks a Seal | (1946) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Takes a Chance | (1948) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The D.A. Breaks An Egg | (1949) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Terry Clane Books
Murder Up My Sleeve | (1937) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Backward Mule | (1946) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Donald Lam & Bertha Cool Books
The Bigger They Come | (1939) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Knife Slipped | (1939) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Turn on the Heat | (1940) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Gold Comes in Bricks | (1940) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Spill the Jackpot | (1941) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Double or Quits | (1941) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Owls Don't Blink | (1942) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Bats Fly at Dusk | (1942) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Cats Prowl at Night | (1943) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Give 'em the Ax | (1944) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Crows Can't Count | (1946) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Fools Die on Friday | (1947) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Bedrooms Have Windows | (1949) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Top of the Heap | (1952) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Some Women Won't Wait | (1953) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Beware the Curves | (1956) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
You Can Die Laughing | (1957) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Some Slips Don't Show | (1957) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Count of 9 | (1958) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Pass the Gravy | (1959) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Kept Women Can't Quit | (1960) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Bachelors Get Lonely | (1961) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Shills Can't Cash Chips | (1961) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Try Anything Once | (1962) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Fish or Cut Bait | (1963) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Up for Grabs | (1964) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Cut Thin to Win | (1965) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Widows Wear Weeds | (1966) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Traps Need Fresh Bait | (1967) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
All Grass Isn't Green | (1970) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Gramp Wiggens Books
The Case of the Turning Tide | (1941) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case of the Smoking Chimney | (1943) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Case Of The Musical Cow | (1960) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Standalone Novels
The Clue of the Forgotten Murder / The Clew of the Forgotten Murder | (1942) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
This Is Murder | (1948) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Dead Men's Letters | (1990) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Exploits of the Patent Leather Kid | (2010) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Short Story Collections
Two Clues: The Clue of the Runaway Blonde / Clue's Don't Count & The Clue of the Hungry Horse | (1947) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Amazing Adventures of Lester Leith | (1980) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Human Zero | (1981) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Whispering Sands | (1981) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Pay Dirt and Other Whispering Sands Stories of Gold Fever and the Western Desert | (1983) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Adventures Of Paul Pry, Volume 2 | (1990) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Blonde in Lower Six Plus 3 Short Novels | (1990) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Adventures Of Paul Pry | (1991) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Honest Money and Other Short Novels | (1991) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Danger Zone and Other Stories | (2004) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Casebook of Sidney Zoom | (2006) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books
The Court of Last Resort: The True Story of a Team of Crime Experts Who Fought to Save the Wrongfully Convicted | (1952) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Hidden Heart of Baja | (1962) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Desert is Yours | (1963) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Hunting the Desert Whale | (1963) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Drifting Down Delta | (1969) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Publication Order of Anthologies
Hard-Boiled Detectives | (1953) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Daring Detectives | (1969) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Tantalizing Locked Room Mysteries | (1982) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Murder Plus | (1992) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Murder on Trial | (1994) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Mammoth Book of Short Spy Novels | (1996) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Oxford Book of American Detective Stories | (1996) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
The Oxford Book of Detective Stories | (2000) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
A Century of Great Suspense Stories | (2001) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Murder On The Railways | (2003) | Hardcover Paperback Kindle |
Renowned as one of the best-selling American authors of the 20th century, Erle Stanley Gardner is globally recognised within the world of literature as one of the best mystery and detective novel writers of all time. His long list of novels, which includes the Perry Mason collection, are still widely accessible, even today, and are taught throughout schools and universities worldwide. But how did this once former lawyer become to be one of the greatest writers the world has seen?
Born in Malden, Massachusetts on July 17th 1889, Gardner was raised within a working class family, and moved around a lot in his childhood due to his fathers job as a mining engineer. He dropped out of Valparaiso University in Indiana, where he studied law, after just one month and instead moved to California where he took his career into his own hands and started working for a law firm as a typist. Proving to be gifted in the law industry, Gardner managed to pass the state bar exam in 1911 after learning himself on the job, and began defending clients in cases, many of which were poorer clients, to get his foot in the door.
By 1917 he had opened his first law office but the company was short-lived as Gardner decided to quit law altogether and take on a job at a sales agency to help support his wife and daughter, who was born back in 1912. He eventually returned to law in 1921 and stayed within the industry until 1933 when he released his first book within the series of the Mason series.
Gardner always stated that although he enjoyed some practices of the law industry, he had become bored with by it, and instead in his free time he started to write for pulp magazines. His first big break in the the writing world came in 1923, when his first story was published in the pulps. He set himself with the target to write at least 1,200,000 words a year, and created many characters during this period which included Lester Leith, Ken Corning and a parody of the gentleman thief’.
Following his small success in the pulps, Gardner began writing his own novels, and under the name of A.A. Fair, he wrote about a private detective firm named Cool and Lam. It was this that gave him the real confidence he needed, and in his next series of books focused on a man named Doug Selby who was known to be a highly regarded crime solver within his fictional world, a very similar situation to that of Perry Mason.
The Case of the Velvet Claws (1933)
The Case of the Velvet Claws was the book that eventually took Gardner away from the law industry in 1933, with a lot of the story set at the Pierpont Inn, which was just down the road from his law office. This was the first book which introduced the world-famous Perry Mason, a tough attorney that was exceptionally gifted within the law profession. It was always Gardner’s dream to have his novels published in the Saturday Evening Post, and to make this a reality he actually had to gradually soften down Mason’s character to make him more appealing to the editors and the readers. Thanks to this relationship, all of Gardner’s books were covered in the newspaper from the early 50s just before they were published – a real promotional contribution to the success of the series.
In Mason’s first mystery, several characters are introduced including Perry himself, Mason’s secretary, Della Street and detective, Paul Drake. What is interesting is that there is no courtroom scene at all in the first novel within the series, a scenario in which the books are famous for in the later series. The Case of the Velvet Claws is based around a very wealthy woman named Eva Griffin who claims she is being blackmailed by her husband, someone who has a lot of money and power. She turns to the famed lawyer for help as she has been unfaithful to her husband and wants to keep everything private, but in the meantime she is accused of murder, and although Perry seemed to help her, he is blamed by the adulterer for the murders.
The Case of the Howling Dog (1934)
Following the success of The Case of the Velvet Claws, Gardner followed with one more story in 1933, before penning three a year later. The Case of the Howling Dog, which was serialised in Liberty Magazine, was a high reaching story about a potential client of Mason’s who talks to him about a howling dog and a will, however Perry turns this down as he he isn’t interested in writing wills nor does not know anything about animals. However it is not until the client claims that the will was made by a person who was executed for murder, which suddenly gets Mason’s attention. This particular novel become a Hollywood movie in the same year, and is arguably regarded as the best adaptation of Gardner’s books.
Alongside the Perry Mason novels, Gardner created characters for radio programs, and many of his novels became hit-films. Finally, in 1957, the Mason novels become a long-running TV-show on CBS, another accolade to his exceptional writing. The Mason novel collection eventually ran to over 80 novels, all of which were deemed a real success and widely accepted worldwide. His readership was extremely broad across the world, and included perhaps one of the most recognised British novelists, Evelyn Waugh, who claimed that Gardner was to him the best living American writer.’
His career came to an end on March 11, 1970, when 80-year old Gardner died in Temecula and his ashes were scattered in California, where many of his novels started. At the time of his death, he was the best selling American writer of the 20th century, and his manuscripts were placed in the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Centre, which are still accessible today. Gardner was then and still is highly regarded within the literature industry, with his work proving to be a great learning point for many people and aspiring writers.
Book Series In Order » Authors »
Really enjoyed seeing all of the Perry Mason books.Thanks
Evelyn Waugh was a man. In England, it is a recognized male name, pronounced like evening, not like ever, as in the US.