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Loading... The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe (original 1938; edition 1939)by Erle Stanley Gardner
Work InformationThe Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe by Erle Stanley Gardner (1938)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. I haven't read one of these for years (decades?). This started off well, but I lost interest a bit, partly because I didn't warm to any of the characters. Perry Mason's performance in court relied on a quite technical explanation of how you determine a particular gun fired a particular bullet, which I also found a bit lacking in human interest. ( ) Published in 1938 - so occasional statements that we now find offensive. As the first big drops of rain splashed to the sidewalk, Perry Mason cupped his hand under Della Street's elbow and said, "We can make it to the department store if we run." She nodded, held up her skirt with her left hand, and ran lightly, her weight forward on the balls of her feet, her stride long and easy, with lots of knee action Perry Mason, long-legged as he was, did not have to hold back on her account. "I'm running my investigation," Sergeant Holcomb said. "Moreover." Mason went on smoothly, "if you neglect this end of it, and the charge should be made that the officers are deliberately overlooking that angle because it suited their policy to close their eyes to a gambling establishment running wide open, don’t you think…" "Who says there's a gambling establishment there?” Sergeant Holcomb demanded belligerently. "I do," Mason told him. "Now, what are you going to do about it?" Sergeant Holcomb thought for a minute and said, "I'm going to make it my business to investigate it." Sarah Breel is observed by Perry Mason to be shoplifting. When she is about to be arrested by a security guard, Mason intervenes and prevents the arrest. Later that day, Sarah is accused of the murder of her brother's associate in trading in diamonds. Sarah claims no memory of any of the events that surround the shooting even though her presence is known because as she fled the scene she was hit by a car and suffered a concussion. Mason uses his usual court room tricks to unravel the prosecutor's steel tight case by casting doubt on a police officer's testimony about whether or not he mixed up the bullets from two guns and two different murders as well as suggesting there were two other people including Sarah's niece who could have committed the crimes. At the conclusion of the novel, we learn who shot the crooked diamond dealer but the court and the police do not since it was Sarah's niece who killed him in self defense and in Mason's opinion it would be very difficult to defend as she shot the man in his own house. no reviews | add a review
Is contained inThe Perry Mason Omnibus: The Case of the Dangerous Dowager [and] The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe by Erle Stanley Gardner Erle Stanley Gardner's Big Mystery Book: The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe [and] The D.A. Calls It Murder by Erle Stanley Gardner
"Sleuthing attorney Perry Mason can't resist a good mystery, so when he sees an older woman being accused of shoplifting during a department store outing with his assistant, Della Street, he doesn't hesitate to intervene. Armed with an assumption of innocence and the legal acumen to silence her accuser, Mason leaps to the woman's defense--until her niece appears, acknowledging her aunt's guilt, and pays for the stolen items. Soon thereafter, Aunt Sarah is accused of stealing a valuable set of diamonds, and her niece, Virginia, enlists Mason's aid. The man who left the jewels in Sarah's care insists that she didn't take them, but when he turns up dead, she's left with nobody to vouch for her. Nobody, that is, but Perry Mason--expert in the art of defending the innocent"-- No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.52Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1900-1944LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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