LULLABY TOWN. [Import] [Hardcover]

Robert. Crais (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: NY: BANTAM. 1992; First Edition ~1st Printing edition (1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0749901128
• ISBN-13: 978-0749901127
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (66 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,096,510 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Robert Crais is the author of the best-selling Elvis Cole novels. He was the 2006 recipient of the Ross Macdonald Literary Award.

A native of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he grew up on the banks of the Mississippi River in a blue collar family of oil refinery workers and four generations of police officers. He purchased a second-hand paperback of Raymond Chandler's The Little Sister when he was fifteen, which inspired his lifelong love of writing, Los Angeles, and the literature of crime fiction.

He journeyed to Hollywood in 1976 where he quickly found work writing scripts for such major television series as Hill Street Blues, Cagney & Lacey, and Miami Vice, as well as scripting numerous series pilots and movies-of-the-week for the major networks.

Feeling constrained by the collaborative working requirements of Hollywood, Crais resigned from a lucrative position as a contract writer and television producer in order to pursue his lifelong dream of becoming a novelist. His first efforts proved unsuccessful, but upon the death of his father in 1985, Crais was inspired to create Elvis Cole, using elements of his own life as the basis of the story. The resulting novel, The Monkey's Raincoat, won the Anthony and Macavity Awards and was nominated for the Edgar Award. It has since been selected as one of the 100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association.

Crais conceived of the novel as a stand-alone, but realized that, in Elvis Cole, he had created an ideal and powerful character through which to comment upon his life and times. Elvis Cole's readership skyrocketed in 1999 upon the publication of L. A. Requiem, which was a New York Times and Los Angeles Times bestseller and forever changed the way Crais conceived of and structured his novels. Larger and deeper in scope, Publishers Weekly wrote of L. A. Requiem, "Crais has stretched himself the way another Southern California writer, Ross Macdonald, always tried to do, to write a mystery novel with a solid literary base." Booklist added, "This is an extraordinary crime novel that should not be pigeonholed by genre. The best books always land outside preset boundaries. A wonderful experience."

Crais followed with his first non-series novel, Demolition Angel, which was published in 2000 and featured former Los Angeles Police Department Bomb Technician Carol Starkey. In 2001, Crais published his second non-series novel, Hostage, which was named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times and was a world-wide bestseller. The editors of Amazon.com selected Hostage as the #1 thriller of the year. A film adaptation of Hostage was released in 2005, starring Bruce Willis as ex-LAPD SWAT negotiator Jeff Talley.

Robert Crais lives in the Santa Monica mountains with his wife, three cats, and many thousands of books. Additional information can be found at his website, www.robertcrais.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hollywood Meets the Real World, May 15, 2003

By 

Donald Mitchell "Jesus Loves You!" (Thanks for Providing My Reviews over 109,000 Helpful Votes Globally) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Lullaby Town : An Elvis Cole Novel (Paperback)

If you have yet to begin the marvelous Elvis Cole series by Robert Crais, you've got a great treat ahead of you! Few series get off to a stronger start than Mr. Crais did with The Monkey's Raincoat, which won both the Anthony and Macavity awards for best novel while being nominated for the Edgar and Shamus awards as well. Stalking the Angel followed powerfully with classic noir style of the 1930s hard-boiled detective up against evil, but moderated with wise cracks. And the books just keep getting better from there in their characterizations, action, story-telling and excitement.

Elvis Cole is the star attraction, the co-owner of The Elvis Cole Detective Agency. He's now 38, ex-Army, served in Vietnam, ex-security guard, has two years of college, learned to be a detective by working under George Feider, a licensed P.I. for over 40 years, does martial arts as enthusiastically as most people do lunch, and is fearless but not foolish. He's out to right the wrongs of the world as much as he is to earn a living. Elvis has a thing for Disney characters (including a Pinocchio clock), kids, cats, scared clients and rapid fire repartee. He drives a Jamaica yellow 1966 Corvette Stingray convertible, and usually carries a .38 Special Dan Wesson.

His main foil is partner, Joe Pike, an ex-Marine, ex-cop who moves quietly and mysteriously wearing shades even in the dark . . . when he's not scaring the bad guys with the red arrows tattooed on his deltoids, which are usually bare in sleeveless shirts. Although he's got an office with Elvis, Pike spends all of his time at his gun shop when not routing the bad guys with martial arts while carrying and often using enough firepower to stop a tank. Pike rarely speaks . . . and never smiles. A standing gag is trying to catch Pike with a little twitch of his lips indicating he might possibly be amused. But he's there when you need him. He drives a red Jeep.

Robert Parker's Spenser is the obvious character parallel for Elvis, but Spenser and Elvis are different in some ways. Cole is more solitary, usually being alone when he's not working. Cole is very much L.A. and Spenser is ultra blue collar Boston. Cole is martial arts while Spenser boxes and jogs. What they have in common is that they're both out to do the right thing, with money being unimportant. They both love to crack wise as they take on the bad guys. The bad guys hate the "humor" in both cases, and can't do much about it. The dialogue written for each is intensely rich.

Mr. Crais has a special talent for making you care about his characters, especially the clients and their kids. You'll want to know what happens to them. With a lot of experience in script writing, Mr. Crais also knows how to set the scene physically and make you feel it. He may be out finest fiction writer about physical movement. He gives you all the clues to picture what's going on . . . but draws back from giving so much detail that you can't use your own imagination to make things better.

I grew up near Los Angeles, and get a special pleasure out of reading his descriptions of the differences in cities, neighborhoods, and buildings in the area. He gets in right . . . and in detail. It's a nice touch!

On to Lullaby Town, the third book in the series. The title refers to the peddler who sells dreams in Lullaby Town. In our case, it's Hollywood.

The peddler in the story is Peter Alan Nelson, a motion picture director dubbed as the King of Adventure by Time magazine (think Steven Spielberg and George Lucas wrapped up into one hyper personality), which also called him "arrogant, brilliant, demanding." In real life, he has the maturity of a male 2 year old, and has worse habits. Elvis is hired to find Nelson's ex-wife and child so Nelson can form a relationship with his son, whom he's ignored virtually from birth. The studio doesn't want Nelson distracted by all this yearning for his son because he's due to start a new movie in three weeks.

Elvis has no trouble finding the ex and the son. They've left a trail a mile wide across the country to Connecticut where Nelson's mousy young wife has turned herself into a successful banker who doesn't want to hear anything from Nelson. At this point, Elvis's job would amount to bringing them all together gently . . . except that the ex, who now calls herself Karen Lloyd, has a little problem with the biggest crime family in the East. Elvis and Joe set out to eliminate the little problem and are tested to the limits of their talents.

The story develops rapidly in small segments from quite different perspectives, usually in chapters of 4-5 pages in length, like a scene in a drama. Each change adds to a mosaic portrait of the characters and the overall situation. So the story moves fast . . . but without leaving you behind. There is enough material in this book to make two novels.

Pay particular attention to the evolution of characters of Karen Lloyd and Peter Alan Nelson. Mr. Crais does a nice job of helping you realize many sides of their characters over a period of about 10 years. That's one quality that makes this book compelling reading.

After you finish the book, you might find it helpful to think about the potential downside of possessing all that you dream of having.

Can you select better dreams to turn into reality?

Donald Mitchell
Co-author of The 2,000 Percent Solution, The Irresistible Growth Enterprise and The Ultimate Competitive Advantage

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Hit from Robert Crais, November 27, 2000

By 

Bill Wise (Gorham, ME USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lullaby Town : An Elvis Cole Novel (Paperback)

Lullaby Town exemplifies the quality we have come to expect from Robert Crais. I have read previous Crais novels and this book is just as well written as the others. For people who like crime fiction, Lullaby Town is sure to please you. It is well written and keeps you involved the entire way.It was difficult to put the book down. All of Mr. Crais's Elvis Cole novels are well done; this is just another one of his typical works. Cole, the main character, is native to Hollywood. So when he is asked by a famous Hollywood director, Peter Alan Nelsen, to locate Nelson's ex-wife and son, Cole takes it in stride. His search takes him to a small Connecticut town. This makes the novel different than the others in the Elvis Cole series. Elvis is removed from his element, L.A and Hollywood and dumped into a small town. However, just because it is a small town does not mean there is any less wrong doing. By removing Cole from his usual surroundings it reveals more about him. Cole appears to have matured. For those who have been reading all of the Elvis Cole novels it is obvious that Cole has matured. We see things in him that are not as apparent in Los Angeles. Later, Cole is lead to the Big Apple to take on the Mob. For those people who are willing to look past the fact that this is just another typical crime fiction, or detective mystery, this novel is a total hit. You feel as though you are shadowing Elvis Cole as he hunts down the ex-wife of Peter Alan Nelsen. I found myself feeling as though I were part of the plot. The novel is truly riveting and keeps you reading. The duo of Elvis Cole and Joe Pike, Elvis's partner, is guaranteed to keep you interested and curious.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Sweet Music, November 14, 2000

By 

Thomas Magnum (NJ, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Lullaby Town : An Elvis Cole Novel (Paperback)

Robert Crais takes Elvis Cole on the road in Lullaby Town. After the first two books in the series took place in exclusively in the L.A. area, Mr. Crais sends Elvis across the country to the East Coast. The book starts out with Elvis being contacted by Peter Alan Nelsen, who is a big time action movie director, to locate his missing first wife and son. The meeting between Elvis and Nelsen at Nelsen's office is hilarious. In Peter Alan Nelsen, Mr. Crais perfectly captures the stereotypical, self-absorbed Hollywood type. After Elvis takes the case, his search leads him to a sleepy little Connecticut town where he locates Karen (the first wife) and Toby (the son). What Elvis discovers is that Karen isn't leading the simple country life, she's laundering money for the mob. Elvis took on the Japanese mafia in Stalking The Angel and this time he gets a crack at the fabled New York mafia in a way that only Elvis can. Taking the storyline out of L.A. is a nice change of pace as we get to see Elvis outside of his normal element. Lullaby Town further cements Mr. Crais as a great mystery writer and he keen eye and sharp wit are further honed in this third entry in the series.