John Gordon is an extraordinary writer with an extraordinary career. He's been writing books for children and young adults for something like 30 years, and yet it's impossible to find more than a couple of his books in print at any time these days. His work is largely of a high standard and would certainly be appreciated by those who enjoy more enduringly better-known writers like Robert Westall or Alan Garner, writers with whom he certainly deserves to be mentioned. Critically, Gordon is regarded as a writer of conspicuous ability, and his The House On The Brink is recognised as one of the best stories written in the M.R.James style ever.

And yet, he goes largely un-noticed, unremarked, unprinted, and -I fear - unread even during today's enlightened times when children's books are finding a wider audience.

Although I think that some of Gordon's best work can be found in novels like Gilray's Ghost or the M.R. James pastiche The Flesh Eater, I adore The Burning Baby, because all of the horror stories it contains are short, and have bite - more than that, they have the atmosphere of menace and lurking threat which typifies his best work, but in concentration. The dark moods of his longer works are presented here in an accessible and immediate form; this book is both a superb introduction to the writer, and is at the same time among his best work.

Indeed, forget the 'children's' tag. While this book doesn't contain conspicuous or gratuitous horrors of an 'adults-only' kind, it could certainly hold its own among horror and ghost stories for an 'adult' market. This is a collection of rare mood and power.

I think that this book was really good. Earl Stanley Gardner is a great author. There were so many twists in the story you'd never know what would happen next.

The buried clock was 25 minutes slow... or was it 35 minutes fast? Mason's explanation of the time difference was that it was keeping sidereal, or star time, which gains 4 minutes a day. He played it up big in the newspapers
to create a juristication battle between two counties, but the clock disappeared, the juristication was settled, and Mason's client went on trial for the murder of her embezzling husband.

The circumstantial evidence was tight, and Mason's only hope was to try and introduce the clock, once again found buried and set on sidereal time. However, there was no legal doctrine he could find to introduce it into evidence... until Mason realized he'd walked into his own baited trap.

Selma Anson found herself a widow after her husband died from supposed food-poisoning at a BBQ thrown by the Arlington family. She invested the insurance money wisely, and amassed a small fortunte from it. She and Delane Arlington also found themselves romantically attached in the wake of the trajedy.

A year later, Selma finds herself followed by an individual, and threatens to slap his face if he keeps at it. She's warned about the legal ramifications of such an act, and consults Perry Mason.

Selma ends up being the target of an insurance company investigation, who claims she murdered her husband, and all the money she made was as an involuntary trustee of the funds, and the victim of the district attorney, who after exhuming the body of her deceased husband, finds the death was due to arsenic. To make matters even worse, Delane Arlington finds a key piece of evidence that would serve to prove her guilt.

It looks bad for her, but she has Perry Mason as her lawyer. His own analysis of the evidence, coupled with his belief in the ability of Lt. Tragg of the police department, allows him to exonerate his cliend... despite claims of wrongdoing by Hamilton Burger.

Why write a long review? Gardner's best mysteries always involve a time element, where Mason gets it right and the DA doesn't. When ESG got busy he dictated, and the time element is absent, the story less interesting

I like this book because I read it around the time of the Olympics and it was exciting. I like how Alex has magic powers so she can do different stuff. From Erin, Age 8.

Steffanie Malden, the client, is a greedy Widow. She is much eager to snatch her late husband's hidden money rather than to mourn for him, and she want to use Mason as a tool. And did she kill her husband cold-bloodedly? Mason fights for the unpleasant client at the risk of being disbarred and/or imprisoned. Lawyer is a hard business.

The most charming point of Perry Mason mysteries is how to reveal the real murderer and/or the real facts convincingly. Also in this book, the thrilling and dramatic revelation of what really happened is splendid! And the the murderer's identity is completely unpredictable and surprising.

I also enjoy quite a few spectacular scenes; D.A. Burger launches his fist at Mason, Mason is sentenced for contempt of court and so on.

This story is an excellent story inline with all the others I've read by Erle Stanly Gardner.

This story like all the others in the Perry Mason series has a series of different twists.

What makes this story so good like all the other ones is that your getting nearly about 3/4s of the way through and you can see that unless something goes drastically wrong for the prosecution then the defendant is going to get the electric chair. But in true Erle Stanley Gardner fashion Perry Mason the defense lawyer pulls the defendant out of the spot that he's in and in doing so he gets his professionalism questioned including accusations of tampering with evidence.

In conclusion This is an excellent book by Erle Stanley Gardner and like others in this series it has the twists and other odd things that happen.

Perry Mason was retained to protect the interests of the Bain family, who were being blackmailed with an audio confession of a crime they didn't commit. Mason manages to erase the recording right out from under their nose, but then finds himself defending Hattie Bain on a murder charge.

Mason's courtroom dramatics hit a high note when he produces a theory which changes the time of death, and puts an witness with an seemingly unshakeable alibi on the hot seat. Then the theory is collaborated with evidence overlooked by the police, and all hell is raised with the prosecutions theory of the case.