I love everything Jonathan Ames writes, but this series is the best thing he’s ever done and this entry manages to be the strongest of a very strong series. Ames manages to mix a short pulpy mystery with a beautifully rendered story and characters. I really hope there are more to come in this series.

Ames is successful humor writer, probably best known for Bored to Death which got made into an HBO show in the late 2000s. His Happy Doll series is pretty pitch black noir stuff, well written but nasty and about as far away from something like Carl Hiassan as it gets. This is the third book of the series and Doll is recovering from the events of the second book in Mexico, and gets drawn back into ugly business. I read the first two Doll books while visiting LA and really enjoyed their sense of place. Ames is clearly inspired by Hammett and Chandler and this has that same caustic violent feel.

In this third novel featuring Happy Doll, our protagonist struggles with his knowledge that he must quit taking lives. It is incompatible with his Buddhist beliefs. This is especially hard, because he frequently finds himself in position where he has to kill, either in immediate self-defense or to prevent worse things being done to innocent people in the future. He does it, of course, but he’s worried about karma.

Happy is thoughtful, big hearted, loyal, and while he gets in all kinds of tough spots, pretty darn lucky most of the time. His inner monologues are deep and frequently funny. He loves his dog, and he cares about what passes for his friends. He just can’t seem to get out of the cycle of death. All the better for us, because we get to enjoy his misery.

Happy’s hard-boiled tales are both thought-provoking and fabulously entertaining. You can tell the author loves Los Angeles, as the city is an honorary character in these novels. The Happy Doll books are worthy additions to the LA noir canon.

I am grateful to NetGalley and Mulholland Books for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book was an interesting read! The themes of suspense, thrills, sneaking around, and detective for a murder was a good mix of all these different topics. I think the writing was good, and the characters were well developed. There were a bunch of funny parts in the book too so that kept it entertaining.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for this complimentary ARC in exchange for an honest review!!