Karma Doll
By (Author) Jonathan Ames
Pushkin Press
Pushkin Vertigo
30th September 2025
3rd July 2025
United Kingdom
General
Fiction
Crime and mystery: private investigator / amateur detectives
Comic (humorous) crime and mystery
Crime and mystery: hard-boiled crime, noir fiction
Thriller / suspense fiction
Paperback
240
Width 129mm, Height 198mm
After narrowly escaping with his life at the hands of a murderous Hollywood pimp, detective Happy Doll, bullet-ridden but healing, has landed on a remote Mexican beach. In a humble shack and with his dog for company, Doll settles into a peaceful idyll of Buddhist study. But then trouble, as it always does, comes to paradise. Doll is the witness to a murder for which he is framed, and now, with an expired passport and the Mexican authorities on his tail, he must sneak across the border back to L.A. by any means necessary, with the goal of bringing the true murderer to justice.
But it's not just trouble that expels Doll from paradise! His dark past reaches for him, like a hand from the grave, old enemies want him dead, including the Jalisco Cartel, and Doll, a reluctant instrument of mayhem, yearns to end this cycle of violence and tip the karmic scales in his favor. But how can he do this without getting blood on his hands
Jonathan Ames is the author of eleven books including Wake Up, Sir!, The Extra Man and You Were Never Really Here, all published by Pushkin Press. He also created the hit HBO comedy Bored to Death, starring Ted Danson, Zach Galifianakis and Jason Schwartzman, as well as Blunt Talk, starring Patrick Stewart. His thriller You Were Never Really Here was adapted for a major Hollywood film by Lynne Ramsay, starring Joaquin Phoenix. Karma Doll is the second book in the series of Happy Doll thrillers that began with A Man Named Doll. Jonathan lives in Los Angeles with his dog Fezzik.