The Case of the Drowsy Mosquito

Perry Mason solves a murder in a mining town in this whodunit from one of the bestselling authors of all time.

When a millionaire enlists Perry Mason to protect his mining interests, the sleuthing attorney and his tireless secretary Della Street trade the Los Angeles streets for the fresh mountain air of San Bernardino. As soon as they arrive at the property, however, things start to go sideways, first with the introduction of an eccentric cast of characters, and then with deception, poisoning, and gunfire. When one of the group falls dead, Mason must throw his deductive powers into overdrive, sorting through red herrings and puzzling clues to reveal whodunit. At the end, his dazzling explanation will hinge on an oddly lazy insect.

A dizzyingly complex mystery set in the great outdoors, The Case of the Drowsy Mosquito combines the fast-paced plots for which Gardner is known with his other great strength as a nature writer. Distinct in its setting which feels worlds away from the typical Perry Mason novel, it exemplifies the page turning entertainment that made the author one of the best-selling writers in the history of American letters.

Several interlocking problems all tricked out with arsenic and hot lead…. This is typical Erle Stanley Gardner stuff, without a dull moment in it.”
―New York Times

Erle Stanley Gardner (1889–1970) was a prolific American author best known for his works centered on the lawyer-detective Perry Mason. At the time of his death in March of 1970, in Ventura, California, Gardner was “the most widely read of all American writers” and “the most widely translated author in the world,” according to social historian Russell Nye. The first Perry Mason novel, The Case of The Velvet Claws, published in 1933, had sold twenty-eight million copies in its first fifteen years. In the mid-1950s, the Perry Mason novels were selling at the rate of twenty thousand copies a day. There have been six motion pictures based on his work and the hugely popular Perry Mason television series starring Raymond Burr, which aired for nine years and 271 episodes.

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Introduction by Otto Penzler.