Turn on the Heat

Cool and Lam #2

by A.A. Fair, Erle Stanley Gardner

A CLASSIC COOL AND LAM NOVEL FROM THE CREATOR OF PERRY MASON, ERLE STANLEY GARDNERHBO series Perry Mason airs June 2020 starring Matthew Rhys in the titular role.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. Among those books were the 29 cases of the brash, irresistible detective team of Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. Last year, Hard Case Crime brought out the first new Cool and Lam novel in decades, THE KNIFE SLIPPED, lost for 77 years after Gardner’s publisher refused it. Now, we’re bringing you the book Gardner wrote to replace it, often considered the best in the TURN ON THE HEAT.Hired by a mysterious “Mr. Smith” to find a woman who vanished 21 years earlier, Donald Lam finds himself facing a sadistic cop, a desperate showgirl, a duplicitous client, and one very dogged (and beautiful) newspaper reporter – while Bertha Cool’s attempts to cut herself in on this lucrative opportunity land them both hip-deep in murder…

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Noir, Hard Boiled, Pulp, Detective

221 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1940

About the author

A.A. Fair is a pseudonym of Erle Stanley Gardner.

Reviews

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Turn on the Heat is one of the earliest books in Erle Stanley Gardner's Cool and Lam series, originally published under the name AA Fair. It's a story about how a few odd clues can lead to a bigger picture. It starts out with Lam being the stranger in a small town on his own ferreting out old secrets about a twenty year old disappearance and the vague and minute clues about what happened to the woman.

But what really makes this book is that it doesn't end there but morphs into a far more complex tale about broken marriages, political mischief, nightclubs, and big city corruption. It's not a bang-bang shoot-em-up tale so much as it's a clever wit against wit tale with each party taking what they know and "turning up the heat" on the other.

[Karl]

(Hard Case Crime Book 131)

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think the Cool and Lam books are not for me.

Turn on the Heat, much like the Cool and Lam novels I've read before it, felt like a poor mans mixture of Perry Mason (this book was written by the same author) and a generic P.I pulp.

The plot is interesting enough yet the dialogue heavy narrative dampers the overall enjoyment. The Cool and Lam detective agency are hired by a mysterious client to locate his estranged wife who hasn't been seen in twenty one years. During that time, the client has remarried, moved town and established a new life for himself - so why does he want to know where his former flame is?

Politics, murder, deceit and a mystery thick with more questions than answers abounds.

My rating: 2.5/5. On the surface, Turn on the Heat looked to be a winner. I enjoyed the banter (as always) between the colorful Bertha Cool and the debonair Donald Lam but unfortunately the book just didn't connect with me.

[James Thane · Rating 3 out of 5]

First published in 1940, this is the second book in the Donald Lam-Bertha Cool series written by Erle Stanley Gardner under the pen name, A. A. Fair. As the book opens, a man calling himself Mr. Smith hires Bertha Cool's firm to track down a woman named Amelia Lintig. Mrs. Lintig has been missing from the small California town of Oakview for the better part of twenty-two years. Mr. Smith seems to know very little about Mrs. Lintig, other than the fact that he wants Bertha to notify him as soon as the agency has found her. Bertha assures the client that Donald, her chief investigator, is a brainy little devil who will have no trouble tracking down the missing woman.

Donald drives up to Oakview and discovers that Mrs. Lintig disappeared in the midst of a local scandal that occurred shortly after the First World War. He husband, a prominent local eye doctor, ran off with his secretary and was never seen again. Mrs. Lintig filed for divorce, received a significant settlement, and soon thereafter disappeared herself. The trail is stone cold. But, as Bertha insisted, Donald is way smarter than your average detective and he's soon piecing together the elements of a very puzzling situation.

Any fan of crime fiction understands that when a guy walks into a detective agency claiming to be "Mr. Smith" and gives them a mysterious assignment, things are never going to be as they appear., and that's certainly the case here. Some bad people clearly don't want Donald poking around in Oakview; pretty soon someone is going to get murdered, and, as always happens in these books, Donald Lam is going to be up to his neck in trouble and headed off to prison unless he can pull a rabbit out of a hat in a big hurry.

This is, obviously, a very dated story, but it's a fun read and it's always entertaining to watch Donald Lam match wits with his adversaries. This book will appeal to anyone who enjoys the pulp fiction from the middle of the last century.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Erle Stanley Gardner was once one of the best-selling writers in the world, and certainly in English, for his Perry Mason series, some of which I would have read from some paperbook pile in my house in my teens. And bolstered by the wildly popular sixties TV show featuring Raymond Burr as Perry Mason, which I would have watched with my family--tv trays and Swanson dinners, Dad chain-smoking, Mom knitting. Fast paced, well-written.

But Gardner also wrote a little grittier series with a pseudonym, A.A. Fair, The Lam & Cool series, through which the Hard Case Crime folks is resurrecting a couple of the better ones. Yep, this is one of those. A good'un.

The new (and what would have been called "salacious," in the fifties) cover was created (by a woman) in the manner of fifties pulp covers. At a recent family reunion I took some of my own (see title) "heat" for carrying around a book one of them joked was "smut." The point of the cover is not to represent anything that happens in the book, really. Oh, you know what the intended point of the cover is. Marketing. Now I'm not sure why I picked it up! Oh, Hard Case Crime! I read those!

Donald Lam is the short and small but still beloved-by-women detective, and Bertha Cool, large, owns the agency. "Smith" is looking for his wife who left him 20 years before. He wants to get remarried. He wants a divorce. She wants something for that. Actually none of these folks in this criminal stew have only one name. They are always using false names/identities. Anyway, when a woman in the mix comes up dead--naked, of course, strangled with a rope--Lam & Cool take the case.

The pages fly by. But very little in the way of salacious activity is related, alas, no matter how fast you turn the pages. It is, however, much better than I expected! Lam is sharp and well-defined, as he bounces his theories off Big Bertha, his sounding board for him, the role of a lot of partners in detective stories. 3.5. But it pushes me to find a couple old musty Perry Masons, too.

[Roger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Erle Stanley Gardner must have had an amazing mind. Apparently he could crank out books with startling celerity. Ironically I have never read a Perry Mason mystery and Mason is Gardner's most famous fictional creation-my familiarity with this author is based solely on his Lam and Cool novels. Turn On the Heat has not seen the light of day in five decades-which just convinces me (as if I needed convincing) that there are a lot of good books out there waiting to be (re)discovered. Lam and Cool are characters in the best sense of that word. Donald Lam is often described as a "runt" but he is a quick thinker with a weakness ofr damsels, in distress or otherwise. Bertha Cool is the one with a real physical presence-she is tough as nails and more than a little avaricious. These novels have all proven to be fast fun reads and Turn On the Heat was no exception. It features a convoluted missing persons case which quickly gets way way out of hand. Good stuff.

[George K. · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Υποψήφιος για φόνο", εκδόσεις ΒΙΠΕΡ.

Το δεύτερο αυτό βιβλίο της σειράς με ήρωες τους Μπέρθα Κουλ και Ντόναλντ Λαμ, αποτελεί την πρώτη μου επαφή με το έργο του Ερλ Στάνλεϊ Γκάρντνερ (γραμμένο με το ψευδώνυμο A. A. Fair). Χθες προμηθεύτηκα αρκετά από τα βιβλία της συγκεκριμένης σειράς, χωρίς να καταλαβαίνω γιατί δεν το είχα κάνει τα προηγούμενα χρόνια, αλλά και γιατί γενικά δεν έχω δώσει την πρέπουσα σημασία στον εν λόγω συγγραφέα (στη συλλογή μου, πάντως, υπάρχουν εδώ και χρόνια, κάπου θαμμένα, τρία-τέσσερα βιβλία με ήρωα τον Πέρι Μέισον). Επίσης το βιβλίο αυτό έχει κυκλοφορήσει στα αγγλικά και από την τρομερή σειρά παλπ μυθιστορημάτων Hard Case Crime, κάτι που για μένα αποτελεί πάντα ένα θετικό σημάδι για οποιοδήποτε βιβλίο. Λοιπόν, πρόκειται αν μη τι άλλο για μια άκρως ψυχαγωγική και ενδιαφέρουσα ιστορία, γεμάτη με εκβιασμούς, ίντριγκες και δράση, με την πλοκή να κινείται με γρήγορους ρυθμούς και με το ένα γεγονός να διαδέχεται το άλλο, χωρίς να υπάρχει χρόνος για να πάρει μια ανάσα ο αναγνώστης. Φυσικά υπάρχει και ένας φόνος στη μέση, καθώς επίσης και μια εξαφάνιση, ενώ ο πρωταγωνιστής ντετέκτιβ (ο μικρόσωμος αλλά ευφυής Ντόναλντ Λαμ) ουκ ολίγες φορές βάζει το κεφάλι του στον ντορβά, για να βγάλει μια άκρη με την όλη μπερδεμένη υπόθεση. Ο συγγραφέας δεν κουράζει τους αναγνώστες με ατελείωτες περιγραφές και άσχετες λεπτομέρειες, η γραφή του είναι απλή και άκρως ευκολοδιάβαστη, με πολλούς διαλόγους και τις απολύτως απαραίτητες περιγραφές. Γενικά είναι ένα βιβλίο που με ικανοποίησε και που μου κράτησε καλή παρέα για λίγες ώρες, και πιστεύω ότι το ίδιο θα γίνει και με επόμενα βιβλία του συγγραφέα.

[Gary Vassallo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my second Bertha Cool, Donald Lam mystery and again I really enjoyed it. The mystery is a real page turner while Bertha and Donald keep it a light and fun read. I look forward to reading more in the series. Recommended.

[Newly Wardell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I preferred the previous volume. In this novel Donald Lam is some kinda ladies man who is great at manipulating women to do his bidding. Which he uses to help a Mayoral candidate avoid a murder charge. Its not a bad mystery but there is an adversarial edge to Cool and Lam relationship that I didn't like. They just refused to be straight with each other and it seems to have created work where none was necessary. This book feature far less Bertha and she was far more dependent on Donald than previous. He is not the best detective because he is constantly tampering with crime scenes and doing things that obstruct justice. Its not a bad read by any stretch of the imagination. I just really loved Bertha Cool and she is marginalized as a grumpy ATM chisler. I mean she didn't even cuss nobody out. Lol.

[Benoit Lelièvre · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh.

Once you've discovered Bertha Cool and Donald Lam, there's not much else to enjoy about these stories. This is somewhat of a by-numbers, dialogue heavy mystery featuring characters Cool and Lam are professionally and personally removed from. So, it's as interesting as our protagonist find it and their heart's not really into work on this one. I love their relationship, which is more adversarial than in The Knife Slipped, but still. It's a bit of a slickly written, albeit empty shell.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

This didn't capture my attention the way I thought it would.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

So far, 3 for 3 in this slam-bang 'Cool & Lam' series. I love this stuff! 

Looking up background info at Wikipedia, I was quite surprised to discover that none of the books in this series were made into feature films (!). That's especially strange considering a) the amount of tv / film mileage that Erle Stanley Gardner got out of his Perry Mason books, and b) the very-noir quality that 'C&L' could have brought to the big screen. 

Not only are these books full of twist-and-turn action / suspense, but they're also (to me, anyway) funny as hell; that very-specific noir kind of funny:

"What makes you think he was a cop?"
"He looked like it, he talked like it, and he acted like it." 

"Good Lord, what happened to your eye?"
I said, "I stubbed my toe." 

"Well, can me for a sardine."

As well - and as in the Perry Mason books - Gardner has a wonderfully visual way of zeroing in on character types.

The back of her hand said she was about twenty-seven. With make-up, her face could have passed for twenty-two.

Early on in this particular series entry, Gardner generously gives us - through Donald Lam's POV - a picture of the American landscape:

I kept on going through the front pages. The Armistice had been signed. The United States was the savior of the World. American money, American youth, and American ideals had lifted Europe out of the selfishness of petty jealousies. There was to be a great League of Nations which would police the world and safeguard the weak against the strong. The war to end war had been won. The world was safe for Democracy.

[What a difference 8 1/2 decades can make.]

When 'The Knife Slipped' (entry #2) was rejected for publishing, Gardner turned right around to 'Turn On the Heat', more or less writing as though 'The Knife Slipped' didn't exist (and wouldn't, in print, until it was re-discovered in 2016). But the casual reader wouldn't notice a thing (except that, in 'TOTH', Bertha Cool doesn't give Donald a new agency car to replace the piece of junk she's too cheap to replace--as she does in 'The Knife Slipped'). 

These are stand-alone cases, independent of each other. 

Narrative-wise, 'TOTH' is just as full of surprises as the first two books. In laying out his strategy for solution (when he finally hits on a way out of a particularly sticky patch), Donald can be known to put something into motion that can confuse the reader at first. But trust Gardner. Maybe a few pages later - or maybe a few chapters later - the windmills of Donald's mind will reveal the wheels within the wheels. And that tends to be a treat. He's a crafty little cuss. 

'TOTH' is a fairly breathless reading experience - again, pages turn themselves. It seems that, to date - and between them - Hard Case Crime and American Mystery Classics have only released a few of the 30 C&L titles (and not in order; not that it matters). I've stocked a few of the others... 'cause I'm smitten.

[Frank · Rating 3 out of 5]

Erle Stanley Gardner is of course the author of the Perry Mason series of crime novels. He also wrote another series about the detective team of Bertha Cool and Donald Lam under the pseudonym A.A. Fair. TURN ON THE HEAT was the second book in the Cool and Lam series and was originally published in 1940.

I read this one because I recently read and enjoyed one of Gardner's Perry Mason mysteries and happened to have a copy of the Hard Case Crime reprint of this Cool and Lam story. Cool and Lam are kind of an unlikely pair of detectives. Bertha Cool runs the operation and is a middle-aged overweight woman who likes to flash her diamonds and doesn't take any crap. Lam is a younger man who may be slightly underweight and short—kind of like a Laurel and Hardy pair of PIs. In this novel, a man named Smith hires them to find a woman named Amelia Lintig who vanished 20 years earlier. Smith doesn't tell them why he wants her found but heads him in the direction of a small town, Oakview, where she lived. Well this case turns very convoluted—Smith is not who he seems, the woman he is after is his ex-wife, and others are also looking for her. The case is all related to another town where Smith is seeking election as mayor to try to clean up the town and get rid of the corrupt people in power. So why does he need to find his ex-wife? A murder happens along the way which Lam also must try to solve since the prime suspect is Smith.

I didn't enjoy this as much as the Perry Mason stories but it did hold my interest. It's not a straight-forward murder mystery but is more of a complicated tale about broken marriages, political corruption, nightclubs, and crooked cops and politicians. I mildly enjoyed this but not sure when or if I will be reading more of these.

[Colin Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love these early american crime novels. An unusual divorce case surfaces in a country town and brings Bertha Cool and Donald Lam into action. There is none of the gun totting cops, as in 87th Precinct novels, but lots of fast action and a very involved plot, bringing on a somewhat contrived ending.

Good honest entertainment with no social message. I liked it.

[Lemar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Erle Stanley Gardner wrote great dialogue. The banter between these 1930’s characters is the bees knees. And, not surprisingly, the plot is clever and once again I didn’t figure it out.

[Manuel Alfonseca · Rating 3 out of 5]

ENGLISH: Donald Lam is a detective that takes ruthless vengeance against those who punch him on the nose or give him a black eye. He falls in love easily, and to Bertha Cool's amazement, makes the girl fall in love with him, although the girl is different in each novel.

The plot of this novel is a little more rational than the plot of the first novel in the series.

ESPAÑOL: El título español de esta novela es "Donald Lam, detective". Donald Lam es un detective que se venga sin piedad de los que le golpean en la nariz o le ponen un ojo morado. Se enamora fácilmente, y para asombro de Bertha Cool, hace que la chica se enamore de él, aunque en cada novela la chica es diferente.

La trama de esta novela es un poco más racional que la de la primera novela de la serie.

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

Having read various reviews of the Cool & Lam series, particularly the favorable ratings given by Goodreads author and reviewer extraordinaire, JT, I decided to jump in with this book. Keeping in mind it was written in 1940, when there were no cell phones, DNA sampling, and people in the big city lived in hotels and boarding houses, this was an enjoyable read.

The plot moves along quite nicely and is clever & complicated enough to make the final reveal a surprise. Donald Lam, an investigator working for the PI firm owned by Bertha Cool, is a great character. He's very smart, clever enough to figure out a complex problem while suffering some physical abuse at the hands of a larger, stronger (just about everyone is bigger than the diminutive Lam) adversary, and endlessly patient with Bertha Cool. And it's the relationship with her, that makes this story a 3 rather than 4 star effort. For the life of me, I can't figure out why on earth someone as competent and resourceful as Lam would put up with the narcissistic, self-serving, greedy Cool, much less work for her. I would expect Lam would do just fine on his own, or employing someone else (to bring some much needed muscle?).

Nevertheless, Gardner knew his business, and obviously enjoyed writing the two disparate personalities to play off of one another. Considering how many of these pulp fiction novels he sold, I'd say he was onto something! But for me, if this is representative of the series generally, I'd only read a smattering and focus on other authors in the same genre. Fun, but not enough for a steady diet.

[Greg · Rating 2 out of 5]

COUNTDOWN: Mid-20th Century North American Crime
BOOK 212 (of 250)
Erle Stanley Gardener without Perry Mason? Let's check out Team Cool and Lam!
HOOK - 2 stars: "I opened the door marked 'Bertha Cool-Confidential Investigations-Entrance.' Elsie Brand looked up from her notes and...said, 'Go on in. She's waiting." Standard opening for the genre: a Mr. Smith is looking for someone and has arrived to hire Bertha. By 1940, this opening had definitely worn out its welcome.
PACE - 3: Nice and light, easy on the brain.
PLOT -3: That Mr. Smith? Naturally, that's not his real name. It's Dr. Lintig, but that's not a real person. But there is a real Dr. Alftmont running for Mayor of Santa Carlotta. And Dr. Alftmont has a closet full of skeletons. One might think that ALL politicians have deep dark closets in which there are many secrets. And one would be right.
CHARACTERS - 3: Oh, Bertha Cool is one for the ages. She is "profane, massive, belligerent, a bulldog" with "her diamonds flashing in the morning sunlight." She's chock full of odd "well can me like a sardine" sayings. She goes immediately to my list of literary characters I'd like to have at a party. Her second is Donald Lam, a "half-pint runt" but "a good beating raises hell with him." He's interesting in the Cool/Lam team, and when they are both in the scene, it's fun. Then there is Mr. Smith who is 2 other people. A Mrs. Lintig who disappeared 20 years previous is still around though. Marion Dunton is a news clerk who, for the purposes of keeping a lid on Donald Lam, has a boyfriend named "Charlie". Then there is Mr. Cross, Evaline Dell Harris, Bill Harris....and a secret love child...and more. It sorta feels, at times, like some people are just fillers for word count. 4 stars for Bertha and Donald. Minus 1 star for abundance of side-characters.
ATMOSPHERE - 1: Nothing. A huge miss.
SUMMARY - 2.4. Yes, Gardner, as A.A.Fair, can put together a cast. Here, that's the big, and really the only, draw.

[John Defrog: global citizen, local gadfly · Rating 2 out of 5]

When Erle Stanley Gardner wasn’t churning out Perry Mason mysteries, he was also writing lots of other books. Under the name A.A. Fair, he wrote 29 pulp mysteries featuring the team of private detectives Bertha Cool and Donald Lam, who ran against the archetype of hard-boiled detectives in that Cool was a middle-aged plus-size woman and Lam was a scrawny little guy who gets beat up a lot.

I tried Cool and Lam once before via another Hard Case Crime reprint, Top of The Heap, and it was okay enough that I picked up this one, which starts with a mysterious “Mr Smith” hiring the agency to locate a woman named Amelia Lintig – the wife of a Dr James Lintig – who disappeared 21 years ago following a small-town scandal involving her husband and his nurse. It doesn’t take long to work out that (1) Smith is really Dr Lintig, and (2) someone doesn’t want Lam poking around trying to find Mrs Lintig.

Things get increasingly complicated to the point that it’s gets difficult to work out who is doing what – especially with Lam trying to keep Cool and a few other characters from knowing what he’s really up to in order to protect them. It’s not bad, necessarily – Gardner knows how to keep things moving along – but I can’t say I found the resolution all that satisfying, or at least the way Gardner builds up to it. And I don’t find Cool and/or Lam to be all that endearing as characters, either. Credit for doing something different, but I’m thinking I may stick with the Perry Mason books from here on in.

[Betsy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Written in 1940 by Earl Stanley Gardner (as A.A. Fair) this is touted on the cover as being the best in the Cool and Lam detective stories. If that is true all I can say is "Wow". For the first 100 pages I was charmed by the old-fashioned style. I can almost her Bogart reading the dialog. But after that I became aware of how really bad the writing is. Even by the standard of the day this book is awful. As an example, the two main characters are Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. Throughout the book Lam refers to his partner by her full name, not just in speaking to her but also when speaking about her. She talks about herself in the third person and calls him "lover". (They are not lovers.) Even if the plot weren't dated it would still be complicated and silly. I skimmed the last 150 pages just to say I had finished it but I don't recommend anyone else give it a try.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Turn on the Heat is one of the earliest books in Erle Stanley Gardner's Cool and Lam series, originally published under the name AA Fair. It's a story about how a few odd clues can lead to a bigger picture. It starts out with Lam being the stranger in a small town on his own ferreting out old secrets about a twenty year old disappearance and the vague and minute clues about what happened to the woman. But what really makes this book is that it doesn't end there but morphs into a far more complex tale about broken marriages, political mischief, nightclubs, and big city corruption. It's not a bang-bang shoot-em-up tale so much as it's a clever wit against wit tale with each party taking what they know and "turning up the heat" on the other.

[Harold · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second Lam and Cool book I've read. This is the book that was issued at the time (circa 1940) as the second in the series. the other was rejected at the time and just recently issued. Again - a good book that will satisfy lovers of noir, but what's interesting, and perhaps insightful into the craft of being a professional writer, is that the dynamic between Lam and Cool is very much different. For me not better or worse but decidedly and intentionally different.

[Yrsa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Det här andra boken i Cool and Lam-serien. Jag har inte läst den första eftersom jag inte har den i min ägo (än) och efter att ha läst den här blir jag lite mer sugen på att läsa den första. Vi märker att Bertha och Donald har inte har jobbat ihop så länge och här är det fortfarande Bertha som äger firman, hon försöker bestämma lite mer och lägga sig i mer vad Donald har för sig än hon har gjort i de andra böckerna i serien som jag har läst. En trevlig serie!

[Johnny · Rating 3 out of 5]

To Turn on the Heat is a metaphor for making things hot enough for a suspect that they will start to boil and, as a result, cough up information. It is a great title for describing Donald Lam’s overall strategy in this Bertha Cool and Donald Lam mystery from Erle Stanley Gardner’s novels written as A. A. Fair. It is also a great title for what a suspect does to Lam in hopes of getting him off the case. Charles Ardai’s Hard Case Crime line has republished Turn on the Heat as well as The Count of 9 and The Knife Slipped (reviewed earlier by your verbose reviewer here on Goodreads).

All the elements of the early 20th century crime novel are present in Turn on the Heat, as well as the suggestive cover that, like the sultry females in 20th century pulp fiction, promises more than she delivers (hopefully, obvious enough that it doesn’t warrant a spoiler tag). The pulp elements in Turn on the Heat are: the client with a hidden motive, the hostile (perhaps, crooked) cop, the shady nightclub, the murdered witness(es), the tight-lipped small town, the secrets of the past, and the K.O.’ed detective. This one has all of those elements, as well as the quirky ones associated with this team of overweight, middle-aged agency owner Bertha Cool and skinny, but hard-boiled, detective Donald Lam: Bertha’s greed and stinginess, Donald’s tendency to keep his “cards close to his chest,” Bertha’s innate curiosity (and mistrust of Donald), Donald’s tendency to follow the “Sucker for a Pretty Face” trope, and Donald’s tendency to rub people the wrong way.

The mystery begins with the client asking the agency to locate a person missing for over two decades. He doesn’t indicate why he is looking for the missing person and pays well enough that the agency is not supposed to ask anything about others who disappeared at the same time. Naturally, Donald decides unilaterally to broaden the lane of the investigation and include those other missing persons in hopes of making it easier to find the original person he was contracted to find. That’s where things get sticky. The townspeople seem to have all but forgotten the individual sought, people go to great lengths to get Lam (who is the opposite of what his last name implies, either as wooly creature or according to the cliché “on the…) off the case, and, predictably, Lam ends up unconscious.

With Lam’s “Sucker for a Pretty Face” trope, it is easy for Gardner (as Fair) to write in multiple “red herrings” who are female. His tendency provides for comedic moments, as well as a bit of good-natured disgust from Bertha. It adds to the effectiveness of these female “red herrings” since Donald seems too trusting of attractive women, no matter what their age. But the ladies aren’t the only persons of interest who act strangely whenever Lam gets close to the truth. And, in touch with the genre in the best way, Lam certainly ends up crossing figurative swords with someone who wields more power and has more resources than he does.

As a mystery reader, I often have two goals: 1) to identify the culprit before the author deliberately reveals said culprit and 2) to become emotionally involved enough that I have a “preferred” suspect—even if I think said suspect is a long-shot to have committed the centerpiece crime of the story. In Turn on the Heat, #2 was close enough to make the story very compelling and #1 was obvious enough that I was, apparently, ahead of the investigators. Naturally, part of the smart-aleck in me enjoys that feeling.

For me, there is a special joy in being able to read the A. A. Fair novels. In 1970, these novels were no longer first-run and not easy-to-find. I was the paperback buyer (which usually meant trade paperbacks, but also a few mass paperbacks) at Southern Cal’s University Bookstore. We had one buyer who came up to the special order desk and filled out a request for every one of the A. A. Fair novels. I was able to find two of the titles for him. I also asked my attractive associate at the help/special order desk to ask him, when he picked up the titles, to ask what was so special about what seemed to be “run of the mill” sleazy paperbacks. Why was a person associated with a prominent university’s faculty interested in these books? He explained to my associate that they were written by Erle Stanley Gardner and difficult enough to get hold of that he wanted us to find the books for him. We didn’t deal in used paperbacks (unless they were textbooks), so it was doubly difficult.

So, I didn’t get to read them in 1970 and there was no world wide web to facilitate a search for them. I would occasionally look in libraries and used bookstores, but usually found only Perry Mason novels under the Gardner name—even though many knew of his pen names: A. A. Fair, Carleton Kendrake, and Charles J. Kenny (not to be confused with the medical writer, Charles Kenney). If you wanted the Charles J. Kenny novel, This is Murder, you’d pay hundreds of dollars. Fortunately, Ardai’s Hard Case Crime has republished the bulk, if not all, of the Cool and Lam series. Personally, I plan to make up for my missed opportunity during my university bookstore days.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one was originally published in the 1930's and moves at a fever pitch throughout. When Cool and Lam are hired to find a woman who left a small town 20 years earlier, they are quickly engulfed in a pattern of intrigue and eventually murder. Soon it seems EVERYONE is looking for that woman-- and her husband-- who were involved in a public divorce action that was never settled.

As usual, Lam is skirting the law as closely as he possibly can while he tries to keep Cool in the dark so that she can't be implicated if he gets caught. His cleverness follows a trail of deceit and guile that would make a con man blush. Yet, each trick leads him closer to a killer.

These old novels are fun and imaginative. Bertha Cool is a tough old bird and her protoge, Donald Lam is smarter than she is. Their relationship is often adverserial even though she is the boss of the detective agency.

If you like the old fashioned stuff you shouldn't hesitate to pick up a copy. The Hard Case Crimew publication has one of their typical eye-popping, colorful and racy covers and the print is easy on the eyes.

[tortoise dreams · Rating 3 out of 5]

The creator of Perry Mason here writing as A.A. Fair. Turn on the Heat is the "official" second outing of detectives Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. An earlier second installment was apparently rejected by the publisher -- in the unpublished novel the agency got a nice new car, here the rattletrap is still in use for the whole book -- I liked the new car. Bertha, a large woman, provides the knowledge and experience, and Lam, a small man with smarts, is a suspended lawyer (legal knowledge being key to his success). The pattern continues from the previous novel(s): Lam falls in love or vice versa, gets beat up periodically, and develops an elaborate and chaotic con to save the day. Cool and Lam don't wholly trust each other and stick together more from need than any tender feelings -- it's not really a bromance -- but their interactions are the core of the story. Bertha's repeatedly described by a few descriptors: her smooth movement, massive bulk, flashing diamonds, cursing and ability to physically handle any woman (and most men). In Turn on the Heat Lam starts getting quite bossy and moves the normally skinflint Bertha to spend some money to save their bacon. Speaking of which, meals are described in detail as this is a novel in which the characters actually eat (a lot). The ending isn't wholly explained and a bit ramshackle but Erle Stanley Gardner seems to enjoy the characters. [3★]

[Aaron · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely a product of its time, but there's a fun pugnacious attitude to Lam that's unlike anything in more modern crime fiction. You can only find a protagonist with his lack of physical abilities and intimidation in the era before detective fiction found itself solidified with the tropes and motifs we all know.

[Vincent Lombardo · Rating 4 out of 5]

A top notch mystery that makes me love the Cool and Lam series even more. Lam is one smart detective. The story is well crafted and the plot is very intriguing. One problem. The ending doesn't add up for me. Lam gets out of the jam he is in a little too easy for me. Either the cops are gullibe or Lam is that charismatic.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm enjoying unearthing the "Cool and Lam" mysteries by Erle Stanley Gardner (who was writing as A. A. Fair...because writing all those "Perry Mason" stories had to be kind of dull) thanks to Hard Case Crime.

According to the back of the book, "Turn on the Heat" (the second Cool and Lam mystery, from 1940 with love) was the book that Gardner/Fair wrote to replace "The Knife Slipped," which publishers didn't care for. "The Knife Slipped," of course, was my first exposure to the Cool and Lam mysteries. It's definitely worth checking out, if you haven't done so already.

"Turn on the Heat" is a more conventional mystery than "The Knife Slipped," but it still has plenty of curves and twists and turns. It's the tale of a client who has a slightly scandalous past that is being blackmailed because he has decided to run for political office as a "reformer" in a very crooked town. But tracking down his former wife to obtain a legal divorce is a difficult process, given that most characters in the book are not who they seem to be. And everyone seems to have a secret agenda of one sort or another.

As I've become accustomed to with this series, the dialogue is sharp and the stories are hard-boiled without being potboilers. It's like watching a good detective movie from the 1940s.

Unlike many Hard Case Crime books, this one is only slightly lurid. The most arousing thing is the lady on the cover of the book. The wild "Jazz Age" life of one of the participants is pretty sanitized. And a female corpse is described as being nude, but there's not much more to it than that. So the story shows its age in that regard and for how neat and tidy the resolution of the case is, which left a few too many loose threads for my liking. I wanted to know a little more about how things worked out for the participants before the story concluded.

But, despite its age, this is a very entertaining and fun mystery--and a worthwhile series. I'm hoping to see more of Cool and Lam from Hard Case Crime in the near future.

[David Burnham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it. Another classic read.