Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Series

This series follows a sharp, cynical private investigator and his imposing, enigmatic partner as they navigate the treacherous landscape of Los Angeles. Operating in the shadow of Hollywood, they tackle complex cases that expose the dark underbelly of the city. Each installment delivers thrilling suspense, intricate plotting, and a compelling exploration of loyalty and justice. Fans of gritty detective fiction will find themselves drawn into their world.

Recommended Reading Order

1
The Monkey's Raincoat
Robert Crais
256 pages
9 hours of reading
4.0(16169)Add rating
When quiet Ellen Lang enters Elvis Cole's Disney-deco office, she's lost something very valuable - her husband and young son. The case seems simple enough, but Elvis isn't thrilled. Neither is his enigmatic partner and firepower Joe Pike. Their search down the seamy side of Hollywood's studio lots and sculptured lawns soon leads them deep into a nasty netherworld of drugs and sex - and murder. Now the case is getting interesting, but it's also turned ugly. Because everybody, from cops to starlets to crooks, has declared war on Ellen and Elvis.
2
Stalking the Angel
An Elvis Cole Novel
Robert Crais
4.0(10828)Add rating
The second blistering Elvis Cole novel from the bestselling author of THE FIRST RULE. Bradley Warren had lost something very valuable, something that belonged to someone else: a rare thirteenth-century Japanese manuscript called the Hagakure. Everything PI Elvis Cole knew about Japanese culture he'd learned from reading SHOGUN, but he knew a lot of crooks - and what he didn't know, his sidekick Joe Pike did. Together, Cole and Pike begin their search in L.A.'s Little Tokyo, the nest of the notorious Japanese mafia, the Yakuza - and find themselves caught up in a white-knuckled adventure filled with madness, murder and sexual obsession. Just another day's work for Elvis Cole...
3
Lullaby Town
Robert Crais
320 pages
12 hours of reading
4.1(9792)Add rating
Reissue of the third Elvis Cole novel from the bestselling author of THE WATCHMAN. Peter Alan Nelsen is a super-successful movie director who is used to getting what he wants. And what he wants now is to find the wife and infant child he dumped on the road to fame. It's the kind of case that Cole could handle in his sleep, except that when Cole actually finds Nelsen's ex-wife, everything takes on nightmarish proportions - a nightmare which involves Cole with a nasty New York mob family and a psycho killer who is the son of the godfather. And when the unpredictable Nelsen charges in, an explosive situation blows sky-high.
4
Free Fall
Robert Crais
4.1(10423)Add rating
Elvis Cole investigates a case that erupts in gang violence in South Central Los Angeles.
5
Voodoo river
Robert Crais
4.2(10604)Add rating
Hired by popular television star Jodie Taylor to find the biological parents who gave her up for adoption thirty-six years earlier, Los Angeles private eye Elvis Cole becomes suspicious when other investigators searching for Jodie's parents are killed. Reprint. PW.
6
Sunset Express
Robert Crais
325 pages
12 hours of reading
4.2(13199)Add rating
It's a headline case: a famous restaurateur is accused of murdering his wife. His celebrity defence team is the best in the business, and they want PI Elvis Cole on the case - to find proof that LAPD Detective Angela Rossi manipulated the evidence. Rossi has been accused of planting evidence before, and it killed her career. Now it's rumoured she'll do anything to make a comeback - even framing an innocent man. But as Cole digs deeper, he learns that in the high-profile world of big-money law, the truth can be bought with blood.
7
Indigo Slam
Robert Crais
304 pages
11 hours of reading
4.2(10390)Add rating
Fifteen-year-old Teri Hewitt has been left holding the babies since her dad, Clark, disappeared without trace. She wants LA private eye Elvis Cole to find him, and although he knows he should refuse and hand it over to social services, he finds himself taking on the case. The search reveals a chronically unemployed drug addict caught up in counterfeiting scams and mixed up with the Russian mafia and Vietnamese gunmen. As the action heads towards a gunfight in Disneyland and Cole dodges his almost-girlfriend's ex-husband, he realises Teri is one whole lot of trouble he should have left to the professionals.
8
L.A. Requiem
Robert Crais
416 pages
15 hours of reading
4.2(484)Add rating
Ex-cop Joe Pike and his partner, private detective Elvis Cole, run afoul of the LAPD's elite Robbery-Homicide Division when they are hired to monitor the police investigation into the death of Joe's former lover, Karen Garcia.
9
The Last Detective
Robert Crais
4.1(272)Add rating
Elvis Cole has got a problem to solve - and this time it's personal. Elvis Cole's girlfriend, Lucy, is out of town, and she has left her young son Ben in Elvis's care. Elvis and Lucy have had a few problems lately - not least over his job as a private investigator. But at last things seem to be getting better. Then Ben disappears. One minute he's playing his computer game in Elvis's house; the next he has vanished. Elvis looks everywhere, but he just can't find Ben; and neither can Lucy when she arrives. Then Elvis receives a phone call about Ben - and realises that something from his own past has come back to haunt him...
10
The Forgotten Man
Robert Crais
4.3(64)Add rating
Six months after nearly losing everything to the men who kidnapped his girlfriend's ten-year-old son, Elvis Cole is slowly coming back to life - when he receives an ominous phone call from the LAPD. An unidentified body has been found in a seedy Los Angeles alley. The only clue the cops have is a packet of newspaper articles about the past exploits of Elvis Cole - and the fact that before the man died, he said he was Elvis's father . . . Joe Pike is the only person who can help Elvis navigate his past. As they investigate, Elvis is haunted by the fact that, at last, he might have found his father. But with each clue they uncover, a troubling picture emerges about the dead man. And as Elvis and Joe approach his true identity, they unwittingly walk straight into a hornet's nest.
11
The watchman
Robert Crais
4.1(291)Add rating
A long time ago, Joe Pike asked for help. In return, he would, one day, be called upon to return the favour, no questions asked. That day has come. Joe Pike is asked to protect the life of Larkin Conner Barkley, a spoiled rich girl who happens to be a federal witness in a major case. But someone is leaking information about their whereabouts, and the killers are getting all too close. So Pike he hatches a plan: disappear into the anonymous underbelly of Los Angeles, turn the tables, and hunt down the hunters. Enlisting the help of Elvis Cole, Pike uncovers a web of lies and betrayals; even the cops aren't who they seem. But as the body count rises, it becomes clear that Pike's biggest threat may be the girl herself - an edgy, yet intensely vulnerable soul determined to destroy herself, unless Joe can fill the void in her bruised heart.
12
Chasing darkness
Robert Crais
400 pages
14 hours of reading
4.0(96)Add rating
It is fire season, and the hills of Los Angeles are burning. As the Police and Fire Departments evacuate the inhabitants, they find something no one expected: the days-old corpse of a middle-aged recluse who apparently committed suicide. Then comes an even more horrible discovery. Clutched in his lap is a photo album containing photographs of seven young women who have been murdered. Each photograph was taken only moments after the women were killed, and could only have been taken by the killer. One murder per year for seven years, their bodies found in different parts of the city. LAPD homicide detectives had never connected the seven murders. But now with the discovery of the 'death album' there is a link. Only one suspect had been charged in any of those cases but, with evidence supplied by Elvis Cole, in the end he walked free. That suspect was the suicide now discovered in the fire...and now the police are out for Cole...
13
The First Rule
Robert Crais
3.9(85)Add rating
Joe Pike is out for revenge and no cop ... no bad guy... no one alive... is going to stop him.
14
The Sentry
Robert Crais
4.2(17445)Add rating
Dru Rayne and her uncle are Louisiana refugees who relocated to Los Angeles after Hurricane Katrina. Now, five years after the storm, their struggling restaurant faces a different danger. When Joe Pike witnesses Dru's uncle beaten by a neighborhood gang intent on extorting protection money, he offers his own brand of protection. But neither Dru nor her uncle want his help--and neither do the federal agents mysteriously watching their store
15
Taken
Robert Crais
320 pages
12 hours of reading
4.1(177)Add rating
Joe Pike must take on his toughest challenge yet. He must hunt down and rescue . . . Elvis Cole. A nail-biting Cole and Pike novel from the No. 1 NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author.
16
The Promise
Robert Crais
4.2(636)Add rating
Elvis Cole and Joe Pike are joined by Suspect heroes LAPD K-9 Officer Scott James and his German shepherd, Maggie, in this heart-stopping thriller from #1 New York Times bestselling author Robert Crais. 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. As the two cases intertwine, they all find themselves up against shadowy arms dealers and corrupt officials, and the very woman they promised to save may be the cause of their own deaths.
17
The Wanted
Robert Crais
3.8(85)Add rating
The New York Times bestselling novel by beloved author Robert Crais. No one knows their child better than a mother. But every kid has secrets... secrets even a mother shouldn't know.
18
A Dangerous Man
Robert Crais
339 pages
12 hours of reading
4.2(774)Add rating
A brilliant new crime novel from the beloved, bestselling, and award-winning master of the genre--and Joe Pike's most perilous case to date.Joe Pike didn't expect to rescue a woman that day. He went to the bank same as anyone goes to the bank, and returned to his Jeep. So when Isabel Roland, the lonely young teller who helped him, steps out of the bank on her way to lunch, Joe is on hand when two men abduct her. Joe chases them down, and the two men are arrested. But instead of putting the drama to rest, the arrests are only the beginning of the trouble for Joe and Izzy.After posting bail, the two abductors are murdered and Izzy disappears. Pike calls on his friend, Elvis Cole, to help learn the truth. What Elvis uncovers is a twisted family story that involves corporate whistleblowing, huge amounts of cash, the Witness Relocation Program, and a long line of lies. But what of all that did Izzy know? Is she a perpetrator or a victim? And how far will Joe go to find out?