PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR

Emptying the trash accumulated in his desk drawer, Bishop, a detective with the LAPD's Sex Crimes unit, discloses subpar stories, two featuring his series heroine Fey Croaker (Chalk Whispers, p. 337, etc.), four one-page vignettes starring dyspeptic motorcycle cop Charlie McQuarkle, and one amiably goofy tale written to commemorate a friend's 45th birthday. Called “The Night of the Frankengolfer,” it pits “the world's most sort-of-adequate consulting detective” Sheerluck Bishop against an evil schemer determined to create a golfing Super-Mensch and combines abductions, nefarious biopsies, and outrageous puns, which culminate in a last-line belly laugh. Other stories feature sneaker theft, a hitchhiking cocaine mule who has the misfortune to catch a ride with a narc, an extortionist too cheap to supply postage, a media executive outwitting a homicidally inclined staff member, a female assassin and her dueling male counterpart, legal aliens torturing illegal aliens, an ex-CIA operative seeking a rock star, three tales of Christmastide morality, and a pair of cop screwups inspired by real life, with Bishop as the goat.

Mostly pulp-style reprints from a 25-year period that help explain why their original venues (Mike Shayne’s Mystery Magazine, etc.) are now defunct.