Books like Escape from Sunset Grove — picked by fans

I love listening to Evanovich’s hilarious tales of Stephanie Plum’s misadventures as a wannabe bail/bondsman. These books are my wife’s and my favorite distraction on long road trips. While her mysteries may be thin, her characters are so real and her stories so crazy, I didn’t miss the whodunit. I included her in this August list because she captures the seedy side of Trenton, New Jersey, with amazing clarity, even while laughing at the place.

I picture myself riding in one of her cars—which she destroys regularly—along with her friend, the former ho, LuLu, hair flowing in the stinky wind blowing off deserted warehouses, sleezy girl joints and questionable car repair shops. This is the first in a series that is now at 31.

Narrator Professor Hilary Tamar’s habits and character traits invite non-stop laughter; and yet amazingly the three young barrister characters are every bit as funny in an entirely different way. One of the barristers always carries the action; but Hilary is no Dr. Watson gasping at their brilliance; in every book, her perspicacity and specialist knowledge enable the murder motive to be unravelled and the murderer brought to justice.

These books are rich in comic dialogue, often given as indirect speech. Caudwell’s unique spin on technical legal language will have you laughing out loud. 

The storyline is enchanting. Without Hilary’s specialist knowledge of ancient Greek texts, there might well have been many more murders! And yet so cleverly is this charming novel plotted, that we almost feel her esoteric expertise is only what might be expected of any amateur sleuth worthy of the name.  

Do you like some romance with your murder mystery? Then you will love Getting Rid of Bradley by Jennifer Crusie. Better known for her many bestselling romantic comedies, twice RITA winner Crusie had been writing laugh out loud love scenes for years before she turned to murder mystery. And boy does it show!

The pace is lightning fast, the dialogue a delight, the snazzy sister talk and keep your hair on cop talk metamorphose swiftly into a laugh-a-minute embezzlement and attempted murder romp. Does true love win? Ask Jake or Lucy. Or perhaps Lucy’s sister Tina, who will always take the opposite view. A well-plotted story that satisfies yet still leaves you wanting more!

My all time fav Humorous Murder Mystery (now out of print but still available currently in the anthology He Do The Time Police In Different Voices) British author David Langford's The Spear of he Sun is set on a spaceship. This gem is simultaneously a terrific Locked Room murder mystery; the best Father Brown story I have ever read (and I've been a Father Brown fan for decades); a wonderful cozy mystery; and a fantastic parody-pastiche of GK Chesterton, The Roman Catholic Church imprints, and Isaac Asimov's SF Magazine, all three at the same time. It's tears-of-laughter-pouring-down-your-cheeks funny, and a Hall-of-Fame-Quality of murder mystery if read straight. Don't miss it.

All of the authors I love do twists really well, twists that make sense and blow you away–no matter how much you try to guess them. This story is set in the world of addictive pharmaceuticals and the desire to make a corrupt company that’s hiding secrets pay for the deaths of innocent patients. A whistleblower is killed early in this story, and this sets everything off. It’s fast-paced with so much action, including bullets flying in the Caribbean as the main characters risk their lives to get incriminating evidence. The ending…oooh, it doesn’t get better than a Joseph Finder twist!

I came upon the novels of Philip Kerr later in life.

They were unique in as much as his main character, Bernie Gunther, was a German before, during, and after the Nazi party came to power. The tightrope Gunther had to tread between being a good German cop and having to deal with Nazi higher-ups without himself ever becoming a Nazi is what makes the series thrum with tension.

I had the great good fortune to meet Philip at the L.A. Times Book Fair to which we were both invited some years ago. Spending time with him was for me to meeting a rock star. I was privileged to make his acquaintance.

The time I subsequently spent reading his new novels gave me the distinct sense of standing beside Gunther wherever Philip chose to send him.

When, several years later, I learned that Kerr had died suddenly I was devastated.… show more.

Joe Pike may live in the City of Angels, but he is as far away from angelic as a man can get.

The ex-mercenary turned sometimes PI is tasked with protecting a spoiled Hollywood princess in this gritty, fast-moving novel. Joe has little patience for doing things the conventional way and no compunction about using violence to get what he wants.

Even though his investigatory methods can be destructive, to both him and others, he’s a man you find yourself rooting for…and wondering about. A compelling PI who anyone would want on their team when it really hits the fan. 

I love the setting and atmosphere of the book, first and foremost. New York City in 1932, just before the end of Prohibition, so there are still bootleggers and gangsters and all that jazz (literally).

I love the characters of Nick and Nora Charles – witty, sophisticated, glamorous, and living a life I can only dream of (literally – I was born 50 years too late!). While it has its humorous elements, this is a hardboiled detective story.

I love the contrast between Nick and Nora and the underworld characters that they encounter, as well as the strong undertone of cynicism that runs through it. It feels more like real life than many other detective stories, where everything is resolved by the end. 

John Connolly is simply a terrific writer. In this Detective Charlie Parker novel, the Maine woods are a character in themselves—sinister, overbearing, and almost certainly harbouring—you guessed it—real evil. Connolly’s Charlie Parker is haunted—literally—and dangerous. He’s a complex and darkly charismatic figure that I find compelling. The Wrath of Angels has at its core the battle between Good and Evil, but it is played out by imperfect characters in a very spooky atmosphere. It has all the ingredients of a horror novel, doesn’t it? But John Connolly manages darker themes believably and again, for me, it mixes genres beautifully—and believe me, that’s not easy.

Peter Lovesey’s detective discovers the power of art in this recent mystery set in Bath, England.

This book in the series is unusual, since most of the story is told through the eyes of a cheap private detective, who views Diamond as a grumpy old man. A body found in an antique sarcophagus and the disappearance of the antique dealer is at the start of the mystery, but the piece of art which was purchased in an antiques roadshow drives the plot.

Greed and ambition, stirred by the provenance of the art, results in several murder attempts which confound Diamond’s and the private detective’s investigation.