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Daphne Beckley comes to Donald Lam to find out what really happened to her husband. He has disappeared and his life insurance contains a double indemnity clause in the event of an accident, meaning Daphne is in line for a windfall. However, if he is still alive, she wants a divorce and alimony. It is up to Donald Lam to discover if she is the jilted wife of a philandering husband, or a beautiful, very wealthy widow.Tags
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Member Reviews
Pass the Gravy is one of the better volumes in the Cool and Lam series. This is the story of two missing persons cases that intersect with postcards from an isolated gas station. One of the cases is brought to Lam by a 15 year old worried about her missing uncle who is often off on a bender but must play in the straight and narrow to inherit. The other by a seductive siren of a woman who can make men melt by just taking off her gloves or swiveling a hip. She wants to know what happened to her traveling salesman husband last heard from in the company of a buxom blonde hitchhiker. And she is already trying to figure out whether she is a widow with life insurance proceeds or on her way to a good divorce settlement with lots of alimony.
Lam show more takes the usual vague clues and finds himself traveling back and forth across the Sierras, finding corpses, using lie detectors, and gambling in Reno.
With all the gamblers, hitchhikers, and teases in this one, it has a bit of a pulpy feel. Probably more smoothly plotted than most in this series, it is an easy fast read. But don't read this looking for gunfights, hoods, and car chases, this is more of a twisted puzzle set out for the solving and somehow Gardner (writing as A A Fair) makes it a compelling read. show less
Lam show more takes the usual vague clues and finds himself traveling back and forth across the Sierras, finding corpses, using lie detectors, and gambling in Reno.
With all the gamblers, hitchhikers, and teases in this one, it has a bit of a pulpy feel. Probably more smoothly plotted than most in this series, it is an easy fast read. But don't read this looking for gunfights, hoods, and car chases, this is more of a twisted puzzle set out for the solving and somehow Gardner (writing as A A Fair) makes it a compelling read. show less
One of Gardner's secondary series about the hasndsome Donald Lam and the fat, ugly Bertha Cool. I casn;t stand Bertha, but fortunately Lam makes most of the running in this case, so I like it better than most of the series. A 14 year old girl persuades Lam to find her uncle, who is due to inherit a trust fund if he is alive and unconvicted of major crime, while Cool has contracted with a sultry brunette to find her husband, a salesman last seen with a "stacked" blonde hitchhiker --the wife would apparently be equally happy to sue him for divorce, if alive, or collect his insurance, if dead. Lam learns the salesman gave a ride to the uncle (a binge drinker broke from a spree and hitchhiking) and picked up the blonde about the same time, show more so the two cases merge.
Incidentally, the cover of this pb version shows a brunette hitchhiker instead of a blonde. Possibly the artist confused the two women in the case. show less
Incidentally, the cover of this pb version shows a brunette hitchhiker instead of a blonde. Possibly the artist confused the two women in the case. show less
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Author Information
863+ Works 30,638 Members
Mystery writer Erle Gardner was born on July 17, 1889 in Malden, Massachusetts. In 1902, he had moved to Oroville, CA. His parents could not afford to send a second son to college, so he worked in a legal office as a clerk reading law. He spent a short time at Valparaiso University in Indiana but had to drop out because of an illegal boxing show more exhibition. He continued to travel throughout California and read law at several law offices and finally passed the bar in 1911, at the age of 21. He married Natalie Francis Beatrice Talbert on April 9, 1912. In 1916, he formed the Law Firm of Orr and Gardner in Venture, CA. Gardner used many pseudonyms such as Charles Green, Kyle Corning and Grant Holiday. While working as an attorney, he began writing fiction. In 1921, "Nellie's Naughty Nighty" was published in the pulp magazine Breezy Stories. He had a goal of writing 100,000 words a month and would sometimes write two or more stories a day. In 1923, "The Shrieking Skeleton" was sold to the Black Mask Magazine. In the 1930's, Gardner had two manuscripts that were rejected and than "rediscovered" by Thayer Hobson, the president of the William Morrow Publishing Company, and rewritten as courtroom mysteries. During this process, the character Perry Mason was born. In 1933, the first Perry Mason book was written, "The Case of the Velvet Claws." The next one was entitled "The Case of the Sulky Girl" and they were followed by more than eighty additional Mason mysteries. Gardner died on March 11, 1970. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Series
Work Relationships
Common Knowledge
- Original title
- Pass the Gravy
- Original publication date
- 1959
- People/Characters
- Bertha Cool; Donald Lam
- First words
- The kid was somewhere around fifteen years old. She was trying her best to be brave and sophisticated.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)"Hell, no. Go out and get hold of this Amos Gage and cut us in on some of that gravy. If Bertha is going to gamble, she may as well shoot the works!"
- Original language
- English
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 106
- Popularity
- 304,268
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.50)
- Languages
- Danish, Dutch, English, German
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 4
- ASINs
- 17
