The Case of the Reluctant Model

Perry Mason Series, Book 66

By: Erle Stanley Gardner

Narrated by: Alexander Cendese

Art student Maxine Lindsay, as the guest of her mentor, art dealer Colin Durant, attends a reception aboard the yacht of millionaire Otto Olney , who is unveiling his newest purchase, a $130,000 Gauguin. When Durant confides that the painting is a fake, Maxine becomes involved in a complicated series of deceptions. Soon gallery owner Leslie Rankin threatens Maxine. Perry Mason is called in, a beatnik artist is accused of painting the fake, and Durant is found fully clothed in Maxine's shower, shot dead with her pistol.

©1961 Erle Stanley Gardner. Renewed 1989 by Jean Bethel Gardner and Grace Naso. (P)2017 Brilliance Audio, all rights reserved.

Fun pulp mystery story let down by cheezy narrator

Earle Stanley Gardiner cranked out Perry Mason mysteries like sausages. They aren't particularly deep, but they're hard boiled fun. You know what you're getting there. The narration here lets it down with cartoony voices based on impressions. Mason talks like Charleton Heston, there's a Dan Acroyd character, a Steve Landesberg from Barney Miller, even a bad Bernie Sanders. The female characters sound like a boy out of a 60s Japanese cartoon show. If the guy didn't try to be "man of a thousand voices" and just focused on acting, it would have been a lot better. It appears that this guy narrates all the Perry Mason audible books. Too bad. I made the mistake of buying four of them at once to binge on. I won't be buying more.