The time is a few decades from now; the place is what used to be the United States, now disrupted ;by internal factionalism as well as a short-lived ;foreign invasion.Out of this chaotic background Ron Goulart has produced a swift-moving, witty and constantly delightful novel, a story of a future odyssey through:• the Nixon Institute, where aging former rock ;stars reminisce about the days when they still had ;hair;• the wide-open sin-town of San Rafael, run by ;the Amateur Mafia (no Italians allowed);• Vienna West, a detailed replica of Sigmund ;Freud's 19th Century city where psychiatric ;patients live and abreact together;• the Monterey Mechanical Jazz Festival, featuring ;the music of pinball machines, jack hammers and ;laundromat washers ...All this plus a dozen or two of the oddest characters you're ever likely to meet. AFTER THINGS FELL APART is a very funny book.

>Copywriter Jim Benning's wife, Joanna, is a model: nervous, beautiful, and prone to meltdowns. In a last-ditch attempt to save their marriage, she agrees to a few sessions with a psychiatrist in San Ignacio—a quack whose psychobabble is more sinister than it appears. But when Joanna disappears, Jim’s only hope is John Easy, the hippest P.I. in Hollywood.Jim gives John a matchbook found in his wife’s purse for a club called Maybe—a swinger’s hideout where morality is not in style—and John plunges into the seedy side of sunny San Ignacio, where the copywriter’s wife led an entirely different sort of existence. To save Joanna from her shadow self, John Easy will have to swing harder than ever before.

His brain scrambled, Jake tries to clear himself of a murder chargeJake Pace comes to on the floor of a dungeon, where a robot jailer is killing rats. The last twenty-four hours are a blank; he doesn't remember anything since he stepped into his skycar, chasing a tip on the Big Bang murders. For weeks the killings have stumped every officer in the government—costing six of them their lives—but a soprano named Palsy Hatchbacker told Jake she knew something that could break open the case. Before he met Miss Hatchbacker, a carnation-wearing goon spritzed Jake with a memory-wiping spray. When the police found him, he was sleeping peacefully next to Palsy's corpse, a laser pistol in his hand.While he rots in jail, the Big Bang killer continues his rampage. Only Jake can bring him to justice, but first he must break out of an inescapable jail.

In Ron Goulart's well received series featuring comedian-cum-amateur sleuth Groucho Marx, Groucho and his writer Frank Denby have made a name for themselves as detectives. In fact, in their last case, they were able to outsmart Sherlock Holmes, or at least the actor playing him. However, both men play down their sleuthing abilities and to escape their new reputation, Groucho agrees to perform in a Broadway play and Frank accompanies his wife on a business trip. When Groucho learns that Frank and Jane are going to New York via train he decides to join them, figuring it will be a nice relaxing journey.However, murder and mayhem somehow follow them across the country. First, before even leaving for New York they are approached by a local mobster who firmly believes that the recent murder of his associate was not a mob hit. He asks them to look into the matter and Groucho suggests that he try "Philip Marlowe, Dan Turner or some other Hollywood shamus" even though "they...

Groucho Marx made the transition from screen to paper in Ron Goulart's widely acclaimed first novel, Groucho Marx, Master Detective, where he debuted as a radio star-cum-private eye. Groucho and Frank aren't enjoying their latest costar, singing child prodigy Polly Pilgrim, a spoiled ingenue. When a prominent Beverly Hills plastic surgeon is found dead in his palatial home, and Polly's mother, the faded actress Frances London, is accused of his murder, Polly's request for Groucho and Frank to help prove her mother's innocence surprises them. She is convinced that Frances has been framed, and despite the mounting evidence against the washed-up perfromer, the pair takes on the case.

A vanished jungle princess forces John Easy to visit the capitol of kook: San Francisco.The jungle scenery is costing Marco Killespie a cool hundred thousand dollars. A stickler for quality, this king of television advertising doesn’t mind writing big checks, but his latest masterpiece—a root beer commercial—is in serious danger of going over budget. Everything was going fine until his leading lady, the up-and-coming Jill Jeffers, disappeared.When a blonde goes missing in 1970s Los Angeles, it’s best to call John Easy. A too-cool private eye whose wardrobe is in better shape than his worn-out VW, he knows every hiding spot in California. The first thing he learns is that Jill is a senator’s daughter. Next he discovers that she’s gone to San Francisco, the weirdest place on Earth. Finding her there will be just as simple as a walk in the jungle.

The Second Mystery Megapack selects 25 more tantalizing mystery tales, by modern and classic authors. Included are:FUNNY STUFF, by Ron GoulartPIT ON THE ROAD TO HELL, by John Gregory BetancourtWHAT IS COURAGE? by Mack ReynoldsJUST THE FACTS, by Meg OppermanTEN GRAINS OF SAND, by Christopher B. BoothMORE ALLISONS THAN I KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH, by Michael HemmingsonREFLECTION OF A DREAM, by Jean LorrahGRIM REAPER'S HANDICAP, by Fergus TruslowCASH, by Arlette LeesSEAS OF MISUNDERSTANDING, by Ray CummingsHOCUS POCUS HOMICIDE, by Gene D. RobinsonTHE RIGHT BETRAYAL, by John L. FrenchJEAN MONETTE, by Eugene Francois VidocqTHE SENDING OF DANA DA, by Rudyard KiplingPHANTOM GETAWAY, by Leon MearsonTHE MURDER OF SILAS CORD, by Harold F. SorensenA BOTTOMLESS GRAVE, by Ambrose BierceDEAD WOMAN, by Dr. David H. KellerHOOK, LINE, AND SUCKER! by Robert TurnerTHE JUDGMENT OF THE GODS, by Robert ReginaldWILL FOR A KILL, by Emil...

PRESENT....CONDITIONAL....FUTURE IMPERFECT! Ted Briar's life turned inside out overnight. His wife was cheating, his job gave him unexplainable feelings that strangers were snooping around....even his household computer began lying to him. Then he was contacted by one of the most wanted fugitives in the United States. And things began to fall — or float — into place.... He was suddenly the leader of a movement to overthrow a vastly dangerous criminal — who happened to be the President of the United States!

In this inventive mystery set in Hollywood's golden era, Ron Goulart revives America's favorite cigar-wielding comic—Groucho Marx. Needing a project to occupy him between movie stints, Groucho agrees to act in a radio serial. But when a beautiful starlet is found dead before production even begins, Groucho is determined to find out who killed her.

When a body is found in Holmes's 221B Baker Street lodgings on the set at Mammoth Studios during the shooting of The Valley of Fear, Groucho Marx and his sidekick Frank Denby begin investigating, in Ron Goulart's hilarious mystery Elementary, My Dear Groucho. The victim is the German emigre director of the movie who was found in the great detective's favorite armchair, stabbed in the chest with Holmes's pearl-handled letter opener. There is another murder but it takes more than murder to stifle Groucho's quips or to quiet the laughter this surprising reincarnation inspires.

Frank Denby and Groucho Marx arrive on the set of the new Ty-Gor film, a Tarzan knockoff, expecting to have Groucho do his humorous walk-on. What they find is that Randy Spellman, the star of the picture, has been murdered. Frank's wife, Jane, is only a few weeks away from having their baby and the amateur detective team has promised to lay off on the sleuthing. But when a stuntwoman who has gone missing is suspected of the murder, Jane insists they take up the case to clear the young woman's name. In addition to being a horrible actor, Spellman was a womanizer and a blackmailer. Many people had reason to dislike him, or even kill him, and the investigation leads Frank and Groucho through the glamour and seediness of 1940s Hollywood, Groucho signing autographs all the while. In this latest installment of the series, Ron Goulart is at the top of his game, reminding readers there's no business like show business, except when this charming team is wearing its...

It could be said that in this episode Groucho Marx operates as a Hollywood-style Scarlet Pimpernel, with a repertoire of outrageous puns covering the steely, daring life of a counterspy. But, as Groucho might retort, his cover is at the dry-cleaner, and, besides, Groucho is not one to hide his light under any bushel (even one of stuffed clams). So he and Frank Denby, his sidekick, scriptwriter and close friend, set out to uphold their reputation as amateur sleuths by looking into the death of British director Eric Olmstead. First Olmstead fainted at a star-studded Halloween party after a man dressed as the Grim Reaper had whispered to him and then disappeared. But it is not until the next day that he is found dead--presumably by his own hand. It is 1939; everyone expects the U.S. to join the war raging in Europe. And everyone is looking under the bed for spies. Soon the questions surrounding the death of Eric Olmstead takes on an odor of espionage. The police...

Jake and his wife grapple with a harebrained Nazi doctorJake Pace is battling a bistro's worth of robotic mafia goons when the government comes to ask him a favor. The Department of Big Business has a particularly sensitive murder on its hands, and Jake, proprietor of Odd Jobs, Inc., is a sensitive detective. A week ago, Statz Kazee announced to a television audience of 140 million that his next scoop would blow the lid off the international business community. Hours later, he was found shot to death, and every federal policemen sent to investigate the murder has wound up dead. Now it's Jake's problem.After battling malfunctioning skycars, sinking houses, and mysterious cowboys, Jake and his wife learn that Statz had information about the fearsome Adolph Hibbler, the nastiest sinner to ever come out of the Nazi scientific community. Seventy years after the end of the war, Hibbler is back, and he'll burn America to the ground if Jake can't handcuff him first.