Don Crouch Reviews: Karma Doll by Jonathan Ames

 

Please welcome back Don Crouch to the blog…

 

The Happy Doll series by Jonathan Ames is the best PI series that you aren’t reading.

 

Trust me on this.

 

Karma Doll finds poor Happy Doll in Mexico, attempting to recover from the explosive events of the previous book, The Wheel of Doll.

 

In short order, he is required to once again violate the Buddhist principles he amusingly tries to live by, within his own semi-addictive limits…he’s trying to not kill people, see…let’s just say he fails miserably.

 

Ames, who also created the classic HBO series, BORED TO DEATH, is in solid form, as Happy careens through the steps necessary to keep breathing and maybe re-establish his life in LA.

 

The book is, by turns, thrilling, funny and contemplative.

 

Amazon Associate Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/4jDGG8G

 

Don Crouch  ©2025

Review: Racing the Light by Robert Crais

Racing the Light by Robert Crais opens with private investigator Elvis Cole in his office on the western edge of Hollywood. It is hot and clear when Ms. Adele Schumacher and her entourage arrive. The entourage arrives first, and after checking out the office, back out so that Ms. Schumacher can talk with Mr. Cole.  Things started off a bit weird so it was a sign for Cole that things would get weirder.

 

Ms. Schumacher has good reason to be believe her son, Joshua Alberta Schumacher, has been kidnapped. She has not received a ransom demand. She firmly believes that he has kidnapped to silence him. Her 26-year-old son is an investigative journalist with his own podcast. She believes that he is being held at a secret government facility. Not surprisingly, her case has gone nowhere with the police as he is an adult and she does not have any real proof of anything.

 

While she may believe in government conspiracies, her fear is very real, and she clearly needs help. Cole agrees to poke around for her so that she knows somebody is listening and looking. He does not expect there is an issue and Joshua probably is fine. He also questions the motives of the people involved in Ms. Schumacher life.

 

It does not take Elvis Cole long to realize that something seriously really is going on. Joshua is very much missing, has odd neighbors, and the folks in Ms. Schumacher life are not at all what they seem. If that was not enough, government spooks from our side and others seem to be involved. Things get murkier and more violent as Cole and Pike work the case.

 

A complicated and fast paced read, Racing the Light, is the latest installment in this long running series. It is also a mighty good read. 

 

 

Make sure you check out Don Crouch’s perspective at https://kevintipplescorner.blogspot.com/2022/11/don-crouch-reviews-racing-light-by.html

 

My reading copy came from the Dallas Public Library System.

 

Kevin R. Tipple ©2023

Don Crouch Reviews: The Wheel of Doll: A Novel by Jonathan Ames

 

THE WHEEL OF DOLL

Mullholland

 

 

Happy Doll is a hot mess.

 

As we encounter him in this, the second novel in the series from Jonathan Ames, best known for the late, lamented HBO series Bored To Death, he’s barely recovered from the events in his “origin story”, A Man Named Doll. And trust me, there’s a LOT to recover from.

 

He’s lost his PI ticket, and is now billing himself as a Security Consultant, while basically doing the same stuff as before, when in walks Mary DeAngelo, who wants to hire Doll to find her mother. Mom has been missing awhile, but she thinks she’s in the Olympia, WA area. After some more background, Mary informs Happy that her mother is Ines Candle, who is, of course, an old flame of Happy’s. His last flame. She is a houseless addict, and Mary wants Happy to try and bring her home. Or so she says...

 

Happy takes the case, and after a vetting dinner with Mary’s husband, is off to Olympia. What follows is a drug-soaked odyssey through the homeless culture in the NW. Happy’s new-found interest in the Buddhist lifestyle is challenged to say the least, as a variety of dangerous encounters leave him within screaming distance of death’s door a couple of times. Regardless of his freshly-inspired devotion to preserving life, the bodies stack up.

 

Ames creates a sympathy of a sort for Happy Doll, and we worry for him as he crashes his way around the case. There are requisite shady characters introduced, and often dispatched, and by the time we get to Ames' thrilling and cinematic conclusion, we are fully bought in to Happy Doll’s world, his place in it, and his desire to live a more meaningful life.

 

Ames finds comedy in awful situations, and that’s a big part of the fun of The Wheel Of Doll. Recommended for PI enthusiasts, and those who enjoy the hero getting tossed around like a rag doll!

Don Crouch ©2023

Don Crouch Reviews: Racing The Light by Robert Crais

 
Please welcome Don Crouch to the blog today with his first of what I hope will be many more reviews.

 

       Racing The Light by Robert Crais

 

Ladies and Gentlemen, Robert Crais is BACK!

Now, you can take this a couple of ways, and they’d both be accurate. Our last encounter with both Crais and his fictional counterparts Elvis Cole and Joe Pike, was 2019’s A Dangerous Man.. And there are folks out there who would claim that the last few Cole/Pike entries were perhaps showing some creakiness.

To both, one empirical, one subjective, I say, THE DUDE IS BACK.

Racing The Light is fast paced with high stakes and the razor-sharp plot and dialogue you expect from someone who is, at this point in the game, just plain better than almost anybody at the art of Crime Fiction storytelling.

Elvis is hired by Adele Schumacher to find her son, semi-notorious podcaster Josh Shoe. Seems Josh is out a bit over his skis on a story, and Mom is worried for his safety.

Motherly instincts matter, folks.

Elvis starts to dig, and soon enough is finding a matrix of Chinese spies, porn people, corrupt political weasels…and maybe aliens!

But wait, there’s more! Racing The Light also features the return of Lucy Chenier! She is visiting with her son Ben, who we know, as he checks out a film program at UCLA. Their conversations are deep in the heart of this story, with BIG stakes for the future, and it’s great to have them both back in the mix. Soon enough, however, fists, and more than a few bullets start flying, and we’re plunged into a consequential adventure that talks about what really is truth in this new communication model we live in.

Crais wants us to get re-acquainted with Elvis here, so Pike is, along with Jon Scott, on board for support and assistance. This REALLY is an Elvis Cole novel, and it’s one of the reasons Racing The Light hits so hard. It’s in the upper tier of Crais’ entire oeuvre, and is one of the best crime books of 2022!

Don Crouch ©2022