America's premier mystery writers -- Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and Erle Stanley Gardner -- make a stunning comeback in the pages of this latest Black Mask suspense novel from William F. Nolan. In another vivid re-creation of Hollywood's Golden Age, Nolan delivers a narrative that propels the reader into the heart of a case in which Erle Stanley Gardner is accused of murder and becomes a hunted fugitive, staying just one step ahead of the law in a desperate attempt to find the real killer. The action sweeps from an M-G-M movie set in Culver City to a glamorous health spa in Carmel on the Pacific coast, from an obscure fishing village on the Gulf of California to the plush estates of Montecito near Santa Barbara - and climaxes in a tense, and ultimately explosive, Beverly Hills murder trial in which Gardner, in true Perry Mason style, chooses to defend himself against a threatened death sentence. During the colorful course of events, readers are treated to a drunken John Barrymore emoting Shakespeare in Palm Springs, a wildly bawdy encounter with Mae West in a steam bath, a full-throttle car chase with racing legend Barney Oldfield, and a shocking phone call from America's foremost gossipmonger, Walter Winchell.