Robert Crais – Racing the Light by Benjamin Crais

Daisy Fuller recalls on her deathbed a tale about Mr. Gateau, a blind clockmaker who built an unusual clock which ticks backwards and who suddenly begins ticking backwards after Hurricane Katrina floods their room. Mr. Gateau’s clock begins ticking backwards once again once Katrina floods the room!

Fox 2000 announced a three-year first look deal with Color Force Productions, led by Nina Jacobson and Brad Simpson (The Hunger Games movies), to produce Suspect, based on a novel written by Robert Crais. Their initial project will commence production later in 2017.

Professional Career

After working as a writer’s room veteran on several award-winning TV shows – such as Michael Schur’s Parks and Recreation on NBC and Chuck Lorre’s (unfortunately cancelled) HBO miniseries adaptation of The Bonfire of the Vanities–Crais decided to pursue his true calling: writing.

Crais has written short stories, BBC radio plays, video games, and numerous screenplays. He is also an editor – his anthology Full Spectrum was honored with the World Fantasy Award for Best Anthology – and mass market publisher at Bantam Books where he created Crime Line as part of their Crime Line mystery imprint and worked with such popular authors as Elizabeth George.

New York Times best-selling author of the Elvis Cole series and inspired by Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Ernest Hemingway and Robert B Parker as literary influences, Robert Parker has published his work in over 60 countries around the globe.

Achievement and Honors

Crais resigned his lucrative Hollywood contract writing and producer job in the mid-eighties to pursue his lifelong ambition of writing novels full-time. Since then, he has published 22 novels: 18 featuring Joe Pike as detective protagonist (including The Monkey’s Raincoat which won Anthony, Macavity Awards as well as being nominated for an Edgar nomination); six stand-alone novels; three omnibus collections and multiple stand-alones as well as receiving over 42 translations worldwide ( his work has been translated into over 44 different languages), winning numerous awards from Mystery Writers of America to Grand Master status among other accolades and achievements.

Racing the Light, the latest book in Elvis Cole and Joe Pike series, was published in November 2022.

Personal Life

Robert Crais is one of today’s most celebrated crime authors with his critically-acclaimed series of novels featuring wisecracking Los Angeles private detective Elvis Cole and his stoic ex-Marine partner Joe Pike, making them unstoppable page-turners with bold characters and cinematic prose that has won critical acclaim.

Elvis and Pike get an unusual call when Lucy Chenier leaves town on business, suggesting her ten-year-old son may have run away and are left without any information regarding how or where he could have come from. With only time ticking away to locate him before time runs out they must race against time to find this missing child – one that will truly test this celebrated duo! This intense tale will leave readers spellbound!

Net Worth

Racing the Light, Crais’ latest book in his Elvis and Joe series is an enjoyable read that delivers both suspense and humor in equal measures. Elvis and Joe continue their entertaining banter throughout, keeping readers guessing right up to the end. Published by Penguin Random House Putnam imprint as hardcover or ebook formats (368 pages).

*I received this book free in exchange for an honest review.