"What would the world be like if the dinosaurs hadn't gone extinct? As this very funny book shows, for one thing, L.A. would be even weirder than it is now." --Dave Barry Vincent Rubio, a Los Angeles private investigator, is down on his luck: He's out of work. His car's been repossessed. His partner has died under mysterious circumstances. And his tail just won't stay put. Vincent is a dinosaur--a Velociraptor, to be precise. It seems the dinosaurs faked their extinction 65 million years ago and still roam the earth, disguised in convincing latex costumes that help them blend perfectly into human society. A heightened sense of smell allows the dinos to detect one another--Vincent's got an odor like a tasty Cuban cigar. When Vincent is called to investigate a two-bit case of arson at a hip dino nightclub, he discovers something much more sinister, which lures him back to New York City--the scene of his partner's death and a dangerous nexus of dinosaur and human intermingling. Will Vincent solve the mystery of his partner's death? Will a gorgeous blond chanteuse discover his true identity, jeopardizing both their lives? Will Vincent be able to conquer his dangerous addiction to basil, or will he wind up in Herba-holics Anonymous? Will he find true love, or resort to crumpled issues of Stegolicious? Somewhere between Jurassic Park and L.A. Confidential lies Eric Garcia's Anonymous Rex, one of the smartest, wittiest, and most entertaining debuts this side of the Ice Age.

In 1999, Eric Garcia made his mark with one of the most striking mystery debuts of the year, Anonymous Rex, hailed as a dino-mite detective yarn by People, inventive and imaginative by USA Today, and a fresh and antic comic thriller by The Seattle Times. Now, with Casual Rex, the sharpest dinosaur-detective in Los Angeles is back, funnier and grittier than ever, for the next tale in this acclaimed series. Vincent Rubio is a private eye, working the angles in Los Angeles with his partner, Ernie. They've got the usual problems bills, bum cases, woman troubles. But being dinosaurs is not a problem, as long as their latex disguises fit properly. Not all dinosaurs agree. Some have joined a mysterious back-to-basics movement led by a beautiful and beguiling Velociraptor to help dinosaurs find themselves, let their tails hang out, and roam about as they really are. When a member of this cult dies under suspicious circumstances, Vincent and Ernie must investigate, while simultaneously handling the case of the missing Mussolini the theft of a rare and priceless prosthetic penis treasured in the dinosaur community. With Casual Rex, Eric Garcia takes readers even more deeply into this warped underworld and succeeds in making it all believable. The result is a novel that is as hilarious and entertaining as it is original.

The inventive, imaginative, and funny detective thriller series starring a dinosaur disguised as a human in modern-day Los Angeles is now a Sci Fi Channel television movie.

Vincent Rubio, the most hard-boiled reptile detective ever, is back on the case in the third installment of Eric Garcia’s cult mystery series about dinosaurs who are still alive and committing crimes in L.A. Rubio’s latest assignment: the dinosaur mafia. As fans of Anonymous Rex and Casual Rex already know, the dinosaurs faked their extinction and live among us, disguising themselves as humans in elaborately designed latex costumes. Anyone could be a dinosaur. Your podiatrist. The crotchety old man who lives next door. Julia Roberts, it is well known, is actually a Stegosaur. When the head of the Raptor mafia asks Vincent Rubio to perform a service, he has no choice but to head for Miami to investigate a team of Hadrosaurs who are muscling in on Raptor territory. It’s dangerous business. Make the wrong move and your tail gets chopped off. Eric Garcia’s third Rex novel is a wildly entertaining mystery and an instant classic of dinosaur mafia fiction—further proof that this gifted author really knows where the bones are buried.

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE • A novel about grifters with issues, by the acclaimed cult author of Anonymous Rex and Casual Rex Roy and Frankie are matchstick men—con artists. Partners in elegant crimes for years, they know each other like brothers and have perfected the rules of the game. Roy is the careful one, saves every penny. Frankie is the adventurous one, hungry for a big score. He wants Roy to join him in running a tricky game, but Roy is distracted by the discovery that he is the father of a punky teenage daughter from a brief marriage that ended years ago. The kid wants to get to know her father. She also wants to learn the family business. Novelist Eric Garcia takes readers into the fast and funny world of grifters with issues. Matchstick Men is a dazzling literary con game that will keep readers guessing until the last page.

"A mighty portrait of poverty amid cruelty and optimism."—Kirkus (starred review) Free Lunch is the story of Rex Ogle’s first semester in sixth grade. Rex and his baby brother often went hungry, wore secondhand clothes, and were short of school supplies, and Rex was on his school’s free lunch program. Grounded in the immediacy of physical hunger and the humiliation of having to announce it every day in the school lunch line, Rex’s is a compelling story of a more profound hunger—that of a child for his parents’ love and care. Compulsively readable, beautifully crafted, and authentically told with the voice and point of view of a 6th-grade kid, Free Lunch is a remarkable debut by a gifted storyteller.

There’s no one and nothing the great detective Nero Wolfe wouldn’t take on if the price was right. That’s something wealthy society widow Rachel Bruner is counting on when she writes him a check for a whopping hundred grand. But even Wolfe has a moment’s doubt when he finds out why the prize is so generous. For the oversize genius and his able assistant Archie Goodwin are about to lock horns with the FBI—and those highly trained G-men have a way with threats, tails, and bugs that could give even sedentary sleuth Nero Wolfe a run for his money. Introduction by Stuart Kaminsky “It is always a treat to read a Nero Wolfe mystery. The man has entered our folklore.”—The New York Times Book Review A grand master of the form, Rex Stout is one of America’s greatest mystery writers, and his literary creation Nero Wolfe is one of the greatest fictional detectives of all time. Together, Stout and Wolfe have entertained—and puzzled—millions of mystery fans around the world. Now, with his perambulatory man-about-town, Archie Goodwin, the arrogant, gourmandizing, sedentary sleuth is back in the original seventy-three cases of crime and detection written by the inimitable master himself, Rex Stout.