Seattle Times: Our readers recommend these mystery novels that are also funny

[SheltieLover]

Last edited Fri Mar 25, 2022, 10:27 PM - Edit history (3)

https://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/books/our-readers-recommend-these-mystery-novels-that-are-also-funny/

Looks like a great list! Enjoy!

On edit, by request: adding 4 paragraphs.

Spencer Quinn’s Chet and Bernie mysteries. A lot of you chimed in for this 12-book series, about a detective agency run by Bernie, who is a person, and Chet, who is a dog. (But can he make cocktails?) The titles all play on famous novel or movie titles; my favorite is “A Fistful of Collars.”

“Squeeze Me” by Carl Hiaasen. Hiaasen’s name came up fairly often, mostly next to this 2020 bestseller about a dead dowager, a First Lady/Secret Service romance, a wildlife wrangler and a lot of hungry pythons.

Colin Cotterill’s Dr. Siri Paiboun series. This 15-book series is set in 1980s Laos, with its main character a doctor who becomes national coroner, inheriting an incompetent boss and quirky staff. Cotterill, an English Australian author, recently concluded the series with “The Delightful Life of a Suicide Pilot.

Also, Evanovich Stephanie Plum series, Pariac O'Donnell, Alan Bradley, Vaseem Khan, J.D. Robb, Sue Grafton, Kinky Friedman, Craig Johnson, Ann George, Lynn Truss, Rhys Bowen, Christopher Fowler, Qiu Xiaolong, Joe Ide, & Donald Westlake.

[BlueGreenLady]

1. Thanks, SheltieLover

I've been looking for some good reads. Will check them out. At the library.

[SheltieLover]

6. Yw!

Enjoy! I'm currently re-reading Jana DeLeon's Miss Fortune series. Laugh-out-loud funny & superb writing!

Fortune is a CIA assassin in hiding in Sinful, Louisiana. She teams up with 2 older women, Ida Belle & Gertie who were spies in Nam. Excellent reads!

[Mme. Defarge]

2. I want to start a local chapter

of The Thursday Murder Club.

[SheltieLover]

9. Enjoy!

[MLAA]

3. Ooh, just ordered the first Thursday Murder Club book. Thanks for the list of recommendations!

[SheltieLover]

8. I don't think I've read them!

Will have to get from library!

Enjoy!

[bahboo]

4. Squeeze Me by Carl Hiaasen is as always with him...a great read....

and as an added bonus, it absolutely skewers the orange fuck....

[SheltieLover]

10. Hysterically funny read, precisely because it skewers tfg & magat women

[MLAA]

11. I have never been disappointed in a Carl Hiassen Novel. And this one was

Hilarious.

Try this one. If you can’t get it at the library there are second hand ones here. Very cheap but shipping is usually around $4. I loved it.

https://www.alibris.com/Off-the-Reservation-Glen-Merzer/book/45710990?matches=9

[cbabe]

5. Paywall. Can you copy/paste the list please?

[SheltieLover]

7. There is no paywall

[cbabe]

12. Says I've used number of free articles allowed for the month. So I can't access.

[SheltieLover]

13. Sorry. I'll try to copy. Give me a bit to do it pls.

[cbabe]

14. Thanks. No worries. No hurry.

[SheltieLover]

15. Yw!

Updated op with info.

[cbabe]

16. Got it! Not sure about Craig Johnson. Would add Robert Crais. Off to library hold site.

for Hiassen titles.

[The King of Prussia]

17. The Baby Ganesh series by Vaseem Khan

A retired police officer with a baby elephant. Very definitely recommended!

[SheltieLover]

18. Sounds delightful!

Ty!

[yellowdogintexas]

19. they are. Just imagine one of those detective/animal teams, where the

animal is a baby elephant.

[yellowdogintexas]

20. The Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries

These are great fun
I lucked up on a cheap special of the full series on one of those discount e-book places.

From the Amazon notes on book 1

A DETECTIVE AGENCY WITH HEART.
ALSO MOM, KIDS, AND A KITTEN!

It’s a dismal day for the PI firm to the stars of Silicon Valley when their own star is huddled in a phone booth instead of tracking down stolen software. Sadly, ace detective Lee Alvarez is currently taking shelter from a deluge while surveilling some rat of a husband. This is way beneath her dignity!

Worse, she may be trapped with another rat. Something in there just moved.

But Lee’s luck just changed—that’s no drowned rat. It’s her thoroughly drenched, pathetically skinny, and terminally cute new BFF— an orange and white kitten tiny enough to fit in a pocket. Well, forget the surveillance.

When you catch on that this is the kind of mystery that starts with rescuing a kitten, you know you're in good hands!


And I just discovered there is a new volume!!! Now I have to wait for the price to go down.....