There are countless Robert Crais courses, tutorials, articles available online, but for some, having a book is still a necessity to learn. This is an up-to-date list of recommended books.
- The Monkey’s Raincoat: An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel (2019)
- Free Fall (Elvis Cole) (1994)
- The Wanted (An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel) (2018)
- The Watchman (Joe Pike) (2011)
- Stalking the Angel (Elvis Cole, Book 2) (1992)
- L.A. Requiem (2011)
- The Last Detective (2004)
- Sunset Express (Elvis Cole) (2005)
- Lullaby Town: An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel (2019)
- Indigo Slam: An Elvis Cole Novel (2014)
- The Promise (An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel) (2016)
- The First Rule (Joe Pike) (2010)
- Chasing Darkness (Elvis Cole) (2009)
- Voodoo River (Elvis Cole Novels) (1996)
- The Sentry (Joe Pike) (2012)
The Monkey’s Raincoat: An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel (2019)
Meet Elvis Cole, L.A. Private Eye. . . . He quotes Jiminy Cricket and carries a .38. He’s a literate, wisecracking Vietnam vet who is determined to never grow up. When quiet Ellen Lang enters Elvis Cole’s Disney-Deco office, she’s lost something very valuable—her husband and her young son. The case seems simple enough, but Elvis isn’t thrilled. Neither is his enigmatic partner and firepower, Joe Pike.
Free Fall (Elvis Cole) (1994)
Elvis Cole is just a detective who can’t say no, especially to a girl in a terrible fix.
The Wanted (An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel) (2018)
It seemed like a simple case–before the bodies started piling up . . .When single mother Devon Connor hires private investigator Elvis Cole, it’s because her troubled teenage son, Tyson, is flashing cash and she’s afraid he’s dealing drugs. But the truth is devastatingly different.
The Watchman (Joe Pike) (2011)
Larkin Conner Barkley lives like the City of Angels is hers for the taking. Young and staggeringly rich, she speeds through the city during its loneliest hours, blowing through red after red in her Aston Martin as if running for her life. Then suddenly she sees another car’s metal-on-metal explosion of a terrible accident and, dazed, finds herself the single witness in a secret federal investigation. For maybe the first time in her life, Larkin wants to do the right thing.
Stalking the Angel (Elvis Cole, Book 2) (1992)
The blonde who walked into Cole’s office was the bestlooking woman he’d seen in weeks. The only thing that kept her from rating a perfect “10” was the briefcase on one arm and the uptight hotel magnate on the other. Bradley Warren had lost something very valuable—something that belonged to someone else: a rare thirteenth-century Japanese manuscript called the Hagakure.
L.A. Requiem (2011)
A reckoning has come to the City of AngelsKaren Garcia is missing and her father doesn’t trust the cops – he wants someone he knows on the case – so he enlists the help of Elvis Cole and Joe Pike.
The Last Detective (2004)
P.I. Elvis Cole’s relationship with attorney Lucy Chenier is strained. Then the unthinkable happens. While Lucy is away on business and her ten-year-old son Ben is staying with Elvis, the boy vanishes without a trace. When the kidnappers call, it’s not for ransom, but for a promise to punish Cole for past sins he claims he didn’t commit.
Sunset Express (Elvis Cole) (2005)
Prominent restaurateur Teddy Martin is facing charges in his wife’s brutal murder. But he’s not going down without spending a bundle of cash on his defense. So his hotshot attorney hires P.I. Elvis Cole to find proof that Detective Angela Rossi tampered with the evidence. Rossi needs a way back to the fast track after falling hard during an internal investigation five years ago.
Lullaby Town: An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel (2019)
Hollywood’s newest wunderkind is Peter Alan Nelsen, the brilliant, erratic director known as the King of Adventure. His films make billions, but his manners make enemies. What the boy king wants, he gets, and what Nelsen wants is for Elvis to comb the country for the wife and infant child the film-school flunkout dumped en route to becoming the third-biggest filmmaker in America. It’s the kind of case Cole can handle in his sleep—until it turns out to be a nightmare.
Indigo Slam: An Elvis Cole Novel (2014)
Life in the California sun suits Elvis Cole–until the day a fifteen-year-old girl and her two younger siblings walk into his office. Then everything changes.Three years ago, a Seattle family ran for their lives in a hail of bullets. Hired by three kids to find their missing father, Elvis now must pick up the cold pieces of a drama that began that night. What he finds is a sordid tale of high crimes and illicit drugs.
The Promise (An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel) (2016)
Elvis Cole and Joe Pike keep their promises. Even if it could get them killed Elvis Cole is hired to find a woman who’s disappeared, a seemingly ordinary case, until he learns the missing woman is an explosives expert and worked for a Defense Department contractor. Meanwhile, LAPD K-9 Officer Scott James and his patrol dog, Maggie, track a fugitive to a house filled with explosives—and a dead body.
The First Rule (Joe Pike) (2010)
When Frank Meyer and his family are executed during a home invasion, the police begin investigating the secret life they’re sure Meyer had. Joe Pike’s on a hunt of his own: to clear his friend’s name, and to punish the people who murdered him.
Chasing Darkness (Elvis Cole) (2009)
It’s fire season, and the hills of Los Angeles are burning. When police and fire department personnel rush door to door in a frenzied evacuation effort, they discover the week-old corpse of an apparent suicide.
Voodoo River (Elvis Cole Novels) (1996)
L.A. private eye Elvis Cole is hired by popular television star Jodie Taylor to delve into her past and identify the biological parents who gave her up for adoption thirty-six years before. Cole’s assignment is to find out their biological history and report back.It seems all too clear cut. But when he gets to Louisiana and begins his search, he finds that there’s something much darker going on.
The Sentry (Joe Pike) (2012)
When gangbangers shake down the modest owner of a Los Angeles eatery, Joe Pike intervenes. For all intents and purposes, Pike saved Wilson Smith’s life. But for reasons of their own, Smith and his lovely niece, Dru, are curiously resentful.
Best Robert Crais Books to Read
We highly recommend you to buy all paper or e-books in a legal way, for example, on Amazon. But sometimes it might be a need to dig deeper beyond the shiny book cover. Before making a purchase, you can visit resources like Library Genesis and download some robert crais books mentioned below at your own risk. Once again, we do not host any illegal or copyrighted files, but simply give our visitors a choice and hope they will make a wise decision.
Robert Crais: Best Reading Order--with Summaries & Checklist
Author(s): Albie Berk
ID: 3460502, Publisher: Albie Berk, Year: 2018, Size: 185 Kb, Format: epub
Stalking the Angel
Author(s): Robert Crais
ID: 729548, Publisher: Crimeline, Year: 2011, Size: 185 Kb, Format: epub
The Sentry
Author(s): Robert Crais
ID: 775504, Publisher: Putnam Adult, Year: 2011, Size: 376 Kb, Format: mobi
Please note that this booklist is not final. Some books are truly chart-busters according to Washington Post, others are written by unknown writers. On top of that, you can always find additional tutorials and courses on Coursera, Udemy or edX, for example. Are there any other relevant books you could recommend? Drop a comment if you have any feedback on the list.