It's April 1944 and Ellery Queen has been working for the military making films in Hollywood. Driving through Death Valley on his way home, his car breaks down. Stumbling over a rise in the desert, he encounters an odd man who seems to come from an earlier time, and is welcomed as a sort of prophet. Queen must root out a growing corruption and comes to the realization that evil can invade the most guarded of people's hearts and societies.

The ultimate elevation of atmosphere and pace over plot and story. Dannay always paid great attention to the form of his novels and it is this characteristic which betrays the hand of the master....
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llery Queen's International Case Book (1964)

BUENOS AIRES: A dismembered body with no identification.
JAPAN: The most astounding bank robbery in the history of crime.
INDIA: Murder by curse.
RUMANIA: The beautiful woman who swindled a whole town...and 16 more tales of mystery and detection, each of them unique and challenging to the daring imagination.

All short stories were originally published in The American Weekly during 1954 and 1955. One of the two true crime books Lee wrote credited to Ellery Queen. (Click on the cover to read more...) 

Sheila, young international leader of haute couture, is found murdered in her Park Avenue penthouse. Two floors down, the distinguished middle-aged millionaire--Ashton McKell--is hauled off to jail. Next to go, Lutecia, his shy patrician wife. And then--Dane, their handsome, sensitive son. Together, a triangle of murder suspects. Ellery,  immobilized, can trick the police into becoming his "legmen" if he discovers The Fourth Side of the Triangle.

The first solution is great. Almost to prove Ellery is fallible a second solution comes to the surface depending on the Inspector's talents. This disappointing "deus ex machina" is not in keep with the rules of fair-play and is given only a few pages... (Click on the cover to read more...) 

ueens Full (1965)

Foster Benedict, aging matinee idol, didn't like playing the sticks. He was sabotaging the Wrightsville production of The Death of Don Juan, turning it into a farce. When the curtain rose on the second act, Benedict was dead. There were plenty of suspects--it seemed Foster Benedict had upstaged everyone in town. Ellery Queen's job was a little like a casting director's--there was plenty of talent, but no one was right for the part of killer!

3 novelettes and 2 short stories, well-done with appropriately clear logic. The opening story, a Wrightsville vignette with another dying clue, is probably the best of the bunch. (Click on the cover to read more...) 

Two great detectives match wits over the centuries, as Ellery Queen and Sherlock Holmes face the greatest puzzle in historical crime: Jack the Ripper. Was he a madman, a malcontent reformer, or a member of the highest nobility? And will Ellery Queen and Sherlock Holmes agree, or come to startlingly different conclusions? An innovative novelization of the hit movie.

A clever and creative pastiche of the very best Sherlockian film adventures where EQ comes up with a second solution that trumps the great Holmes! Partly ghost-written by Paul W. Fairman.
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ace to Face (1967)

It was death for "Old Glory"--and the only clue to the murderer of Gloria Guild, the singing "Glory" of the 30s, is her dying scrawl--"Face." Why face? Whose face? Ellery Queen pursues the Glory Riddle from the Bowery to a way-out wedding--and a surprise climax that will jolt you into cold shock. And any reader who nails this killer is a genius or a cheat.

A good story on its own, but elements seem like replays from former novels. At least the solution is satisfying and clever, but haven't we seen the Showdown at a Wedding Ceremony bit before? (Click on the cover to read more...)

he Woman in the Case (1967)
                   aka   eadlier Than the Male

Hair-raising collection of stories about women who killed...who killed for money...who killed out of jealousy...who killed for the sheer love of killing. Mothers. Daughters. Wives. Girl friends. Schoolgirls. Hardened gun molls. Murderers all! Read about: The mother who murdered her son's wife. The beautiful pistol-packing hillbilly who made Dillinger look like Casper Milquetoast.  And dozens of other horrifying tales.

These stories were all published originally in The American Weekly during 1958 and 1959.  Lee's second true crime books credited to Queen from material gathered by researchers. (Click on the cover to read more...)