Talking about the weather is tedious, and hearing others talk about it is just a tiny bit less excruciating than listening to them talk about their health issues.

Nonetheless, the beginning of August in New York was truly hellish, with temperatures hitting three digits — a point brought home to my staff and me since, 10 months after moving into our new bookstore, we still had no air conditioning, mainly due to our landlord, who has the arrogance of a dictator, the selfishness of a rock star, and the caring nurture of an Irani prison guard. More than one murder method has crossed my mind, and I’m confident no jury in the world would convict me if I escorted them to my office. Perhaps similar experiences helped produce murderous thoughts in the fertile brains of some of the distinguished mystery writers born in the month of August.

One of the best, as well as one of the most successful, thriller writers in America is Nelson DeMille, born August 23, 1943. Because the gigantic tomes he has produced for nearly three decades have risen to the top of the best seller lists, it is easy to forget his early novels. While they are ostensibly different in every way, they share the single most vital ingredient of good fiction — readability.

Mega-sellers of more than a quarter of a million words, such splendid novels as “Word of Honor,” “The Charm School,” “The Gold Coast,” “The General’s Daughter,” “Plum Island,” and “Night Fall” deal with big social and moral issues, including terrorism, the aftermath of the Vietnam War, elements of the Cold War, and how individuals handle the complexities and emotional disruptions of their own lives within the larger context of global competition and hostility.

While some authors focus their attention on the large-scale action of organizations (the CIA, the Army, the Mafia) or governments, and others illuminate the internal forces of good or evil in the struggles of individuals, Mr. DeMille has the rare ability to seamlessly blend both elements in his colorful and memorable adventure novels.

These expansive blockbusters are in stark contrast to his early and largely forgotten works, which were short (50,000 words) paperback original novels about New York cops, seven of which were published in a two-year period, between 1974 and 1975. The first three featured a sergeant in the homicide division named Joe Ryker; in the last four he was named Joe Keller, though the name is the only major difference between them.

These tough hombres are as fearless and violent as Mike Hammer and Dirty Harry, with the same sense of morality as both. If you are a bad guy, you are in trouble, and justice in the world of Ryker-Keller is far more important than the law.

I live in hope that these hard-to-find books will be reprinted someday. Even though they are early works, produced at breathtaking speed while the author was still learning his trade and polishing his talent, the witty dialogue, coherent and suspenseful plots, and impeccable pacing combined to produce novels that are dramatically superior to most published fiction.

An author similar to Mr. DeMille in many ways (though I doubt anyone else has ever said this) is P.D. James, born August 3, 1920. Wait — before you toss the paper in the trash can, let me tell you what I mean.

The early novels by Baroness James are police novels, far more plot-driven than her later books, which tend to be motivated more by theme and rumination, but at the same time noticeably slimmer, more Olive Oyls than the Roseanne Barrs of recent vintage. Just as Mr. DeMille’s Sergeant Ryker can engage in conversation about Dostoevsky and Caesar, Baroness James’s Adam Dalgliesh is quotatious, always ready with an apt line or two from a classic used to illuminate a point.

The literary styles of these two superb authors emphatically have no connection. The American tells his tales like a no-nonsense bullet train on a track as straight as a Donna Reed-Jimmy Stewart movie, while the Brit tells hers in the manner of a leisurely gondola ride through the canal-maze of late-night Venice, uncovering them as lushly and slowly as a virgin bride in a Victorian romance novel.

Still, in spite of their stylistic differences, there is a philosophical similarity between the two, a sense of right and wrong — with a strong, even urgent desire for the right to be triumphant. This is a good reason to read and venerate both.

John Buchan, best known for having written “The 39 Steps,” so famously filmed by Alfred Hitchcock, was born on August 26, 1875, the same day on which, in 1884, Earl Derr Biggers popped into the world, for which all fans of Charlie Chan, his creation, may be grateful.

Other gifts of August include Dorothy B. Hughes, the first female hard-boiled writer of such classics as “In a Lonely Place,” “The Fallen Sparrow,” and “Ride the Pink Horse,” who was born on August 10, 1904.The bestselling creator of Alex Delaware, Jonathan Kellerman, was born on August 9, 1949, and Mary Roberts Rinehart, the first American woman to make the best-seller lists regularly with mystery novels, would have celebrated her 130th birthday on August 12.

Was there ever a more versatile writer than Ira Levin? Born on August 27, 1929, his first novel was the perfect “A Kiss Before Dying,” and his second the iconic “Rosemary’s Baby.” This was quickly followed by the book that added a phrase to the language, “The Stepford Wives,” and later by “The Boys From Brazil.” He also wrote one of the most successful mystery plays of all time, “Death Trap,” some years after his hilarious Broadway success “No Time for Sergeants.” He even wrote the lyrics for one of Barbra Streisand’s greatest hits, “He Touched Me.”

Maybe August was a good month for producing outstanding mystery writers, but I’ll still be happy to see the end of it. And the end of heatstroke causing my staff and clients to topple over like axed redwoods.

Mr. Penzler is the proprietor of the Mysterious Bookshop in Manhattan and the series editor of the annual “Best American Mystery Stories.” He can be reached at ottopenzler@mysteriousbookshop.com.