Hot Cash, Cold Clews

Ninety-years ago, before Erle Stanley Gardner began writing the very successful Perry Mason series, he wrote for the pulp magazines. The hundreds of pulp magazines that published his works can be difficult to get these days. The pulps were called that because the magazines used cheap wood pulp for its paper, a process that created pages that were not meant to last a century.

One of his most popular characters was Lester Leith, the urbane Robin Hood, who steals from the rich and gives to the poor, after taking his own commission. Written mostly during the Great Depression, these stories showed wit and humor that Gardner often displayed in his personal life, but infrequently in his works.

Only a handful of the Lester Leith stories have appeared since their original publication dates. Hold Cash, Cold Clews will double the number of Leith stories anthologized. This is the fourth collection of Gardner’s pulp characters in Crippen & Landru’s Lost Classics series.

"I awarded a four-star rating [to The Amazing Adventures of Lester Leith] and suggested there must be others worthy of discovery. These seven, with an introduction by Jeffrey Marks, support that view." EQMM, "The Jury Box" by Jon Breen.