The Case Of The Crimson Kiss

Perry Mason #83

by Erle Stanley Gardner

THE CASE OF THE CRIMSON KISS,
FINGERS OF FONG,
THE VALLEY OF LITTLE FEARS,
CROOKED LIGHTNING
and AT ARM'S LENGTH

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Short Stories, Classics, Detective, Novels

189 pages, ebook

First published April 1, 1971

About the author

Erle Stanley Gardner was an American lawyer and author of detective stories who also published under the pseudonyms A.A. Fair, Kyle Corning, Charles M. Green, Carleton Kendrake, Charles J. Kenny, Les Tillray, and Robert Parr.

Innovative and restless in his nature, he was bored by the routine of legal practice, the only part of which he enjoyed was trial work and the development of trial strategy. In his spare time, he began to write for pulp magazines, which also fostered the early careers of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. He created many different series characters for the pulps, including the ingenious Lester Leith, a "gentleman thief" in the tradition of Raffles, and Ken Corning, a crusading lawyer who was the archetype of his most successful creation, the fictional lawyer and crime-solver Perry Mason, about whom he wrote more than eighty novels. With the success of Perry Mason, he gradually reduced his contributions to the pulp magazines, eventually withdrawing from the medium entirely, except for non-fiction articles on travel, Western history, and forensic science.

See more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erle_Sta...

Reviews

[Paul Weiss · Rating 2 out of 5]

A weak example of the Perry Mason franchise!

Fay Allison, the happy bride-to-be, is going to marry the man of her dreams, Dane Grover. In rather marked contrast, her somewhat more bohemian roommate, Anita Bonsal, is having a tawdry, clandestine affair with Carver Clement, a married man (who like so many other married man involved in affairs is conducting himself in considerably less than honourable fashion). When Allison's Aunt Louise arrives to attend the wedding, she is horrified to discover both girls drugged and near death. Louise, who is familiar with the exploits of lawyer Perry Mason through her friend Della Street, asks for his help in dealing with the affair.

While THE CASE OF THE CRIMSON KISS is certainly a prime example of the B-movie type tough guy police-lawyer-criminal dialogue that Erle Stanley Gardner and other novelists of the era used to such effect and the chauvinistic treatment that all of the male protagonists exhibited towards any females who made their way into the narrative, it isn't a particularly memorable mystery. Indeed, if this was the first Perry Mason mystery that I had read, I would be wondering what all of the fuss was about. And I would certainly be questioning how Perry Mason had earned such a prominent position in history both in print and on the small screen.

Well, unlike his near invincible protagonist Perry Mason, Erle Stanley Gardner can't win 'em all! Recommended only for historical value.

Paul Weiss

[Jill H. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to admit that I am a great fan of the old tv series of Perry Mason (1957-66) starring Raymond Burr and it is still being shown on several stations. But I had never read a Perry Mason book and now I wish I hadn't.

I was influenced by Raymond Burr's portrayal of Mason which was terrific and was disappointed in the book's Mason. In this book, he was pretty colorless and the relationships among the continuing characters were nothing like the program. That is really odd since the author had complete oversight of the television version.

The plot is good................a married playboy has a girlfriend(s) on the side in a secret apartment and is murdered. On his forehead is a crimson lip print indicting that a woman killed him. A totally innocent young neighbor is accused of the crime and Mason takes on her case. There is a nice twist at the conclusion but I just couldn't appreciate the book as much as I hoped I would. I am obviously spoiled by the television program which also adapted this story as one of the episodes.

[Sharon Barrow Wilfong · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is more of a short story but very good setting up. A combination of whodunnit mystery and the inverted mystery. We don't know who commits the first murder, but we do know who tries to cover it up, even attempting to commit another murder. Why does someone who has not committed a murder, try to frame someone else and even try murder the person they are framing. You'll have to read the story to find out.

[Rick Mills · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book contains:
The Case of the Crimson Kiss (novella), and these short stories:
Fingers of Fong
The Valley of Little Fears
Crooked Lightning
At Arm's Length

This review is only of The Case of the Crimson Kiss.

Major characters:
Fay Allison
Dane Grover, Fay's fiancé
Louise Marlow, Fay's aunt
Anita Bonsal, Fay's roommate
Carver Clements, Room 702, wealthy cheating playboy
Shirley Tanner, Room 701, annoyed neighbor
Perry Mason, attorney
Lt. Tragg, homicide

Synopsis: Fay Allison and Anita Bonsal share a 6th floor apartment. Previously, they had each dated Dane Grover, now Fay is engaged to him; much to Anita's dismay. Anita is now having an affair with playboy Carver Clements, who keeps a 7th floor love-nest apartment for his own pleasure in the same building - unknown to his wife at home.

Anita goes to Carver's apartment for a date and they have an argument - Carver keeps stringing her along that he will get a divorce, but of course it's all talk. Anita goes to his car to wait for him, but he doesn't come down. She returns to his apartment to find him dead - poisoned - and with a big lipstick kiss on his head.

Anita sees an opportunity to stick Fay with the murder (and thus reclaim Dane). She puts some of Fay's clothes and belongings in Carver's room, removing her own. Then, to set up an alibi, she dopes Fay - and herself - with sleeping tablets, thinking Fay will not survive her dose. Fay's aunt, Louise Marlow, arrives to find the two girls in a stupor and calls Perry Mason. Mason goes to court as Fay is accused of murder. The crux of the case is: whose lips made the goodbye kiss on Carver's head?

Review: This one (a novella) feels like a regular-length Mason which has been boiled down to its essentials, which makes for a fast, concise read without all the red herrings. There is still room for the old switcheroo (the clothes exchange) which seems a hallmark of Perry Masons - although this time he had nothing to do with it.

The courtroom scene is good and Mason pulls a stunt which would - in real life - likely get him hit with an assault charge.

The presentation of events was a bit jumpy and flashbacky, but he pulled it off nicely; and I had to scratch my head a bit to present the synopsis above in a sequential manner. This story is a good one for one - maybe two - sittings before turning out the light. You may get to learn something about lipstick prints, too.

[Don · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book overall. Not the best but it was a good sampling of his other works. "The Case of the Crimson Kiss" was a good case. It felt a bit rushed but a good story. I think the best story was the desert story. "The Valley of Little Fears" had great pulp characters and great style.
"Crooked Lightning" had a great build-up but the climax left me wanting and re-reading the last page to see if I missed something of if that was really the end.
"Fingers of Fong" was another good detective yarn. That one and "At Arm's Length" I pictured Alan Ladd at the anti-hero. I wish there were more stories with these characters as these stories seemed like origin stories and could work very well in developing something more.
Four stars because the collection as a whole is a good resume for Gardner and showing diversity. Vignettes that show a good range.

[B.R. Stateham · Rating 3 out of 5]

A novelette, one of two, out of the Perry Mason double whammy, The Case of the Caution Coquette. Not bad. Some nice courtroom scenes. Some interesting twist and turns in investigating two apparently separate crimes that wind up being just one big, complex crime.

But the ending . . .oh my gosh! The ending is so confusing and contrived it almost killed the whole story for me. Still, I like the Perry Mason novels as a whole. The orginal Mason is so different that what has been portrayed on the small screen.

It's a three star rating, so I don't know what that means for you. I'd give it a look-see (if you can find a copy of it. It's an old, oldie)

Good luck on that.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection features one longish Perry Mason short story (about 70 pages) and four short stories from Gardner's pulp period (each between 30-40 ages). The Mason story is a quick, fun, and typical of the Mason novels most who read this review will already be familiar with. However, the short stories that follow are the real winners here. Moody and dripping with atmosphere, the four stories that round out this collection are pure pulp and a heck of a lot of fun! You have to know what you are getting here, but this stuff makes for a pleasant afternoon read. You'll feel like Garner has taken you back in time because he is so good at setting up atmosphere.

[Judith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book overall was fun reading if you like the old classics, but buried inside is a delightful short story no one should miss. Discovering it was like actually finding a small, but nearly perfect diamond in the of those tourist attraction "Real Diamond Fields." "The Valley of Little Fears" is that small jewel. Look for it if you get a chance.

The main novelette and other short stories were good also.

[Freya · Rating 3 out of 5]

I particularly enjoyed the Fingers of Fong and Gardner's detailing of the Oriental society in LA. Jerry Marr also made an impact with his fast wits and smart cheeky thinking.

[Annie Yotova · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first of the two collections published in 1971 but it contains the second Mason story chronologically (out of the only 4 that he wrote).

If you find your married lover murdered in the apartment he kept so you can be together, what would you do:
a) Call the police
b) Pretend you did not find him and let someone else find him
c) Give enough sleeping pills to your roommate to kill her, move her things to the dead man apartment and take a smaller dose of the pills so you appear drugged?
If you answered with a) or b), then you are not Anita, one of the first two characters we meet in "The Case of the Crimson Kiss" ("The American Magazine", June 1948) - Fay and Anita. Fay is happy because she has just been engaged and is about to be married (as soon as her aunt comes to town). Anita is not exactly happy - she used to go out with the man her roommate is about to marry - and she has her own issues with the man she is now seeing. When he turns up dead, she figures she can escape the whole thing... and only chance saves Fay. At least for now - before long she is apprehended for the murder and Perry Mason is called to help. It is an unusual story in a lot of ways - the reader knows the truth (or part of it anyway) and Perry does not get to the idea of it until relatively lately. The solution itself is a classical Mason one - no Sherlock-style deduction but just knowing the science of detection.

In "Fingers of Fong" ("All Detective", March 1933), a Chinese man is accused of killing and robbing a woman - and Dick Sprague is sent to investigate and try to find the truth. It is one of the Oriental stories by Gardner and despite the times he writes in, it is almost non-racist (it probably won't be published today but it is pretty mild for the 30s). There is a crime boss, there are sacred jades statues and there are more dead people. Plus a bunch of policemen who are happy to just have a killer and don't care about the truth.

"The Valley of Little Fears" ("Argosy", September 13, 1930) is one of the Bob Zane/Whispering Sands stories. Fred Smith moves to a mine town and seems to be afraid of everything. He gets his job but he also becomes the butt of every joke. Until the local cafe owner takes him under her wing and decides to help him - and Fred Smith learns to stand his ground.

"Crooked Lightning" ("Detective Fiction Weekly", December 29, 1928) introduces us to a diamond dealer whose job is to travel with some very expensive stones. Spotting one of the big gem thieves on the same train, he decides that the man is there to rob him - so he breaks a rule or three and even partners with another dealer who he had worked with but never met. It is obvious where that story is going but reading it is still a pleasure.

The last story, "At Arm's Length" ("Detective Fiction Weekly", December 9, 1939) introduces us to Jerry Marr, a PI who looks at the newspapers for cases the police struggles with and finds a way to work on them. A woman is killed in her own house and noone seems to have any idea what happened. Before long, Jerry finds not only the man who is being framed, but also the people who are framing him. Some of the ways Jerry worked the case reminded me of some of the Perry Mason novels - both how Paul and Perry worked in some cases.. Gardner never wrote another Marr story so it is possible that he just got what worked and used it in his big series.

A solid collection if you are in the mood for some vintage detective/crime stories.

[Richard Rogers · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a collection of 5 short stories. The Crimson Kiss, a Perry Mason story, is the longest of them. The others have a random cast of characters.

I enjoyed this collection. I've only read a little by Erle Stanley Gardner, and so far I like him pretty well. I'm not a lover of the genre, I'll admit, but I'm trying to give it a chance, and these are pretty entertaining. I wouldn't call this noir, nor is it super gritty. Realistic, let's say, but not depressing. Another thing I like is that they're not too long but they are still complete. There is no ambiguous ending like you find with many types of short stories, whether fantasy or literary or whatever. This isn't just a vibe; it's a self-contained story, with a beginning, middle, and end. There's a mystery, an investigation, and a resolution where we know who did it. (The bad guys might get caught or they might get away, but we know what happened.) That tidy completeness is satisfying, and the brevity means the story doesn't overstay its welcome.

The stories were written in a period stretching from the late 20s into the 40s. Some of what I found intriguing was how modern much of it seemed despite the years separating the author and the reader, something I've noticed with Gardner before. (The lack of cell phones is probably the most notable difference from the present. Cars and planes and roads and guns and cops and people all feel pretty similar to today, though.)

Anyway, if you like old-fashioned crime novels, you don't need me to tell you about Gardner or his most famous creation, Perry Mason. If, like me, you're just wanting to try the genre out, this author is a great place to start.

Now I think I need to track down some of the grittier stuff from that era. Just to see.

[Robynne Lozier · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have not read any Perry Mason stories for well over 20 years!!

I also had no idea that Erle Stanley Gardner wrote short stories.

This is a short story. It is usually published in a volume of short stories, but my e-book edition appears to be a standalone.

Since I was reading this for a PRIDE Rainbow Reading Challenge in June 2023, I did find an online copy of the short story volume, and judging by the TOC, this story is about 70 pages long.

But it also has 11 chapters. Pretty short chapters. Between 3 and 5 pages each.

The Main essence of the story is that a Man is found dead in his apartment with a spilled wine glass with the remains of Cyanide in it, and a Crimson lipstick print on his bald forehead.

There are 3 possible suspects. Fay Allison, the girl whose finger prints are all over the second glass, the ex wife of the dead man, and possibly Perry Mason since he was seen leaving the apartment just before the police were called.

There is a 4th suspect as well. The irritating young lady in the apartment across the hall from the dead man, who kept complaining about all the visitors buzzing the door of said apartment.

There was also one very interesting fact I learned from this story.

Lip prints are just as individual as fingerprints. So anytime you see a Lipstick kiss, that print can definitely identify its owner - if you can find those lips in the first place!!

I gave this 3 stars, mostly for the poor editing. One of the characters had his surname mispelled several times part way through the story. There were several other minor spelling errors as well.

[James Thane · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Case of the Crimson Kiss is a collection of Erle Stanley Gardner's short stories. The title story is a short novella featuring Perry Mason, the Los Angeles attorney who was Gardner's most famous creation. The Mason story dates from 1948, while the five other stories are from the 1920s and '30s.

The title story requires Mason to solve what is, basically, a version of the locked room mystery. The principal clue is the outline of a crimson kiss left by the lipstick of some woman on the forehead of a man who has been murdered. It's certainly not the best of the Mason stories and requires that Perry actually physically assault a witness on the stand during the climactic trial scene--something that probably any judge would have frowned on, even in 1948, and even if the lawyer was Perry Mason!

All of these stories seem pretty dated and awfully improbable. The volume was published in 1972, a couple of years after Gardner's death, and a cynic might suspect that this was a ploy by Gardner's estate to round up a few of the author's old short stories and bundle them together to make a few bucks while the opportunity still existed.

Whatever the case, this is a volume that would probably appeal to only the most dedicated of Gardner's fans who were determined to read every piece of his work that they could get their hands on. More casual readers, curious about Perry Mason or others of Gardner's characters, could find much better places to start.

[Serdar Poirot · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fay Allison ve Anita Bonsal ev arkadaşıdır. Fay, Dane Grover ile ertesi gün evlenecektir. Anita arkadaşı ile buluşacak gibi yapıp, bir üst kattaki sevgilisinin yanına gider. Onunla bir yere gidecektir arabada bekler, gelmeyince tekrar yukarı çıkar ve ölmüş olduğunu görür. İş kendisine kalmasın diye Fay'e uyku ilaçlı kahve yapar. Onun eşyalarını ölmüş sevgilisinin odasına yerleştirir. Fay'in teyzesi eve gelince ikisini de baygın bulur. Della Street'in arar ve Perry de olaya müdahale eder. Ölen adamın odasına gidince bir komşu zil sesinden rahatsız olduğunu söyler. Tam onlar çıktıktan sonra 4 kişi daha gelir. Komşu onlara da kızar. Sonra polis soruşturması başlar. Tüm izler Fay'i gösterir ama Mason Drake ile araştırmalara devam eder. Mahkemede ise ölen adamın alanındaki ruj izini sürpriz bir isimle karşılaştırmak ister. Anita ise delil bozma suçlamasından dolayı salondan kaçar. Acaba katil kimdir? Bunun dışında Fong Çetesi adına araştırma yapan adam, mücevher uzmanı olan Bob'un trende bir kızla tanışması, ikisinin de Slick Simms'den kaçması ama en sonunda Bob'un mücevherlerinin çalınması anlatılıyor. Son hikayede de kendi geçimini olayları inceleyip sağlayan Jerry Marr'ın bir cinayet soruşturmasında bir benzinlik satın alması, Gost adındaki adamdan para alması, onu şantajcılardan korumak için çalışması ve devamı anlatılıyor. Keyifle okunan bir roman.

[Josh Hitch · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection is 5 tales beginning with a Perry Mason novella. It's good, not read a bad Mason story yet, about a guy who gets killed and a girl, with ties to Mason's secretary, gets set up for the fall.

Fingers of Fong is a private detective story, one who works exclusively for a powerful Chinese tong. He must work to get a Chinese man free, who was wrongly arrested for theft and murder.

The Valley of Little Fears is an odd ball story about a very nervous man who showed up in a desert town and seemed to fear everybody. Though with some encouragement from a strong woman diner owner and a trouble shooter for the mine he tries to work out his problems.

Crooked Lightning is a jewel heist caper that was very clever.

And last but not least was a hard boiled detective story At Arm's Length. A broke private detective during the depression, figures out a murder-blackmail scheme and cuts himself in by placing himself in the middle as kind of guardian to collect a fee.

Would recommend, I've only read some of Gardner's Mason novels, but if the short fiction included in this collection is an example of his other stuff, then I need to read more of it. I enjoyed all the stories in this collection.

[Alonzo Church · Rating 3 out of 5]

You don’t read Perry Mason for the beautiful writing.

You don’t read Perry Mason for deep insights into human nature.

You read these things to see how Perry is going wriggle out of the traps and annoying ethics rules and keep the LA DA from convicting another innocent. That means, the better Masons are the ones with a formidable antagonist and an enraged Hamilton Berger about to finally get Perry disbarred.

We don’t have that here. Instead we have a decently convoluted plot about a woman who does her roommate dirt to dodge an unjustified murder rap. Problem is that the prose is flatter than a Nebraska prairie, and Perry is far too superhuman to stand a chance of losing his case. So the main course is a two star slab of dull.

The three pulp stories, however, are pretty good, and you can see the raw materials from which ESG developed Perry. Fingers of Fong has Gardner’s private eye extract a member of a Chinese tong from a racist sheriff out to convict the guy for murder. At Arm’s Length has a private eye scaring up some business by carefully reading the local paper, and thereby discovering a blackmail racket. The other two stories show ESG doing a good job with a western tale and a caper story.

Get this one for the pulp tales. Skip Perry.

[Christopher Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a collection of short stories by Gardner, mostly non-Mason books. The first story is a novelette about Perry Mason dealing with a complicated sequence of events handled in typical Mason style -- little regard for law enforcement, plenty of guts, and last-minute accomplishment.

The other stories are short tales of different characters such as the one about a man who is a coward that owns a cowardly dog, a man who does detective work for the Tongs in Chinatown, San Francisco, and a PI during the depression who's not above blackmailing someone to get a client.

Most of the stories pre-date the Perry Mason character, and are more noir then the usual lawyer stuff. Some of the men aren't particularly likable, but are interesting to read. Its nice to see some other writing than the familiar character from this incredibly prolific author, but you can tell he hasn't quite honed his writing craft yet.

[False · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm finishing up a project where I've read all of Erle Stanley Gardner for the past several years, including Perry Mason, Bertha Coo, Donald Lam and a smattering of non-fiction, usually about the Southwest or mining. A lot of mining pops up in Perry Mason, especially in the 1950's.

This book is a novelette and contains the stories: The Case of the Crimson Kiss (1948), Fingers of Fong (1933), The Valley of Little Fears (1930), Crooked Lightning (1928) and At Arm's Length (1939).

[John Bunyan · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the second of three books, published after Erle Stanley Gardner’s death, that have a Paerry Mason novella and a few other unrelated short stories. These stories had been published in magazines decades earlier. The novellas don’t measure up to the regular novels. The short stories range from poor to so-so. I will read the last one but only because that finishes the entire series for me.

[Richa · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. Considering that this was a collection of short stories and not a single case, I was pleasantly surprised to see that Gardner did write in different styles. There is a thriller here, a fast paced heist too, alongwith my favorite Mason novellete!

[Ramkarthik · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a set of 5 novellas / short stories as others mentioned. I liked the mix of characters and you could see glimpses of Gardner's writing style and characterization showing through. 5 stars for the variety and entertainment value.

[Sherry · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short little Perry Mason story...such a diabolical plot in such a short ditty. At least in this one, the way Perry solves it isn't so obstruse. Lots of possible culprits but the least likely was the actual one.

[Jon · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I think you'd better have the doctor take his patients to a sanitarium where they can have complete quiet," he said.
"He seems to think they're doing all right here."
"I distrust doctors who seem to think," Mason said.

[Leew49 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cleverly plotted Perry Mason from the original series by Erle Stanley Gardner. This novelette was also adapted faithfully for the TV series starring Raymond Burr.

[James Vest · Rating 3 out of 5]

Five stories including a Perry Mason novelette which reads like an underdeveloped draft of an otherwise fine mystery. Recommended only for completists.

[Kim Schulze · Rating 2 out of 5]

Short stories. Only 1 a Perry Mason. Meh.

[Craig Schlossin · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you like Gardner you will like these short stories.

[Nikki · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was very short and very easy to read even while distracted by my little kids. It is in the middle of the Cautious Coquette book.

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good story, but… this really isn’t novel length. More, it is either a long short length or a novella, not advertised as either. Still, the plot and characters are engaging, and twisty at the end.

[Dutch Leonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Novella and short stories.