Reading Order
Elvis Coleseries.seoTitleShort
Start with The Monkey's Raincoat and continue through all 20 books in the listed reading order.
Start Here
Start with The Monkey's Raincoat
Book 1 by Robert Crais • Published 1987
Los Angeles PI Elvis Cole is hired by frightened housewife Ellen Lang to find her missing husband and young son. What begins as a domestic case drags Elvis and partner Joe Pike into Hollywood power games, drug money,...
Complete List
Elvis Cole reading order
Ends with The Big Empty
- 1
Book 1:The Monkey's Raincoat
Robert Crais • 1987
Los Angeles PI Elvis Cole is hired by frightened housewife Ellen Lang to find her missing husband and young son. What begins as a domestic case drags Elvis and partner Joe Pike into Hollywood power games, drug money,...
- 2
Book 2:Stalking the Angel
Robert Crais • 1989
When a wealthy businessman loses a priceless Japanese manuscript, he turns to Elvis Cole and Joe Pike to get it back. Their search through Little Tokyo pulls them into Yakuza territory, family secrets, and a kidnappin...
- 3
Book 3:Lullaby Town
Robert Crais • 1992
Temperamental Hollywood director Peter Alan Nelsen hires Elvis Cole to track down the ex-wife and child he abandoned years ago. The trail leads to the East Coast, where organized crime, hidden loyalties, and old regre...
- 4
Book 4:Free Fall
Robert Crais • 1993
Jennifer Sheridan begs Elvis Cole to help her fiancé, a decorated LAPD officer whose behavior has suddenly changed. Following the young cop into South Central, Elvis and Joe uncover a dangerous mix of elite police uni...
- 5
Book 5:Voodoo River
Robert Crais • 1995
TV star Jodi Taylor wants to find her birth parents before a medical crisis finds her. Elvis Cole’s search takes him back to rural Louisiana, where small-town secrets, immigration scams, and deadly swamp politics make...
- 6
Book 6:Sunset Express
Robert Crais • 1996
A famous Los Angeles restaurateur is accused of murdering his wife, and his high-powered lawyer hires Elvis Cole to prove a detective tampered with the evidence. As Elvis digs, he finds a media circus, political press...
- 7
Book 7:Indigo Slam
Robert Crais • 1997
Three fiercely independent kids walk into Elvis Cole’s office and hire him to find their missing father. The hunt leads from Los Angeles to Seattle and drops Elvis and Joe between counterfeiters, Russian mobsters, fed...
- 8
Book 8:L. A. Requiem
Robert Crais • 1999
Joe Pike asks Elvis Cole to help a powerful businessman whose daughter has vanished in Los Angeles. When her body is found, an old LAPD nemesis takes over, dragging Joe’s buried past into the open and turning a murder...
- 9
Book 9:The Last Detective
Robert Crais • 2003
While Lucy Chenier is out of town, her young son Ben disappears from Elvis Cole’s house. The kidnappers seem obsessed with Elvis’s Vietnam past, forcing him and Joe Pike to relive old wounds as they race to save the b...
- 10
Book 10:The Forgotten Man
Robert Crais • 2005 • 2 recommendations
An unidentified man dies in a cheap motel claiming to be Elvis Cole’s father. Haunted by the possibility, Elvis and Joe Pike follow a trail of old newspaper clippings, cold cases, and dangerous strangers that tie the...
- 11
Book 11:The Watchman
Robert Crais • 2007
Wealthy party girl Larkin Barkley survives a late-night car crash and becomes the key witness in a secret federal case. When killers close in, Joe Pike is hired to keep her alive, forcing him off the grid as he and El...
- 12
Book 12:Chasing Darkness
Robert Crais • 2008
A man Elvis Cole once helped exonerate is found dead in an apparent suicide, clutching an album of photos of murdered women. Branded an unwitting accomplice, Elvis and Joe must reopen the old case to learn whether the...
- 13
Book 13:The First Rule
Robert Crais • 2010
When a home invasion leaves Joe Pike’s old friend and the man’s family slaughtered, Joe refuses to believe the victim was dirty. Teaming up with Elvis Cole, he pushes into Los Angeles’s Serbian underworld, where reven...
- 14
Book 14:The Sentry
Robert Crais • 2011
Joe Pike stops a violent shakedown at a Venice convenience store and quickly regrets stepping in. The grateful owner and his niece vanish, leaving Joe and Elvis chasing them through gang territory, storm-damaged backs...
- 15
Book 15:Taken
Robert Crais • 2012
Nita Morales is sure her missing daughter has run off with her boyfriend and staged a fake ransom call. Elvis Cole discovers the young couple have been seized by bajadores, border bandits who traffic in human beings,...
- 16
Book 16:The Promise
Robert Crais • 2015
Hired to find a grieving mother who has vanished, Elvis Cole traces her to a quiet Echo Park house hiding a killer and a cache of explosives. His case collides with LAPD K-9 officer Scott James and his dog Maggie, for...
- 17
Book 17:The Wanted
Robert Crais • 2017
Devon Connor hires Elvis Cole to learn where her teenage son’s sudden wealth is coming from. Elvis uncovers a trio of young burglars, a stolen laptop that matters to the wrong people, and a pair of relentless killers...
- 18
Book 18:A Dangerous Man
Robert Crais • 2019
Joe Pike happens to witness a bank teller being forced into a van and instinctively intervenes, only for the woman to be targeted again. As he and Elvis Cole dig into her life, they uncover hired guns, buried identiti...
- 19
Book 19:Racing the Light
Robert Crais • 2022
Adele Schumacher arrives with cash, bodyguards, and wild conspiracy stories, insisting her missing son Josh, a provocative podcaster, is in danger. Elvis Cole’s search for Josh and his girlfriend exposes political cor...
- 20
Book 20:The Big Empty
Robert Crais • 2025
Influencer Traci Beller hires Elvis Cole to investigate her father’s decade-old disappearance from a small desert town. What looks like an abandoned family case turns into a hunt for a sadistic killer, drawing Elvis a...
Guru Endorsements
Thought Leaders Who Read This Series
Quick Answers
Elvis Cole FAQ
What is the best order to read the Elvis Cole series?
The recommended reading order is the numbered order shown on this page, starting with The Monkey's Raincoat.
How many books are in the Elvis Cole series?
There are 20 books currently listed in the Elvis Cole series on GurusReads.
Where should I start with the Elvis Cole series?
New readers should start with The Monkey's Raincoat, the first book in the reading order.
Is the Elvis Cole series complete?
Based on the publication years we have, the series appears possibly ongoing and spans releases from 1987 to 2025.