Croaked! -- Dick Lochte

When I received a review copy of Croaked!, I took a look and thought, "Three hundred and ninety-three pages. I don't read books that long." But this was a book by Dick Lochte, and I liked Sleeping Dog, Laughing Dog, Blue Bayou, and The Neon Smile, so I figured I'd read a few pages just to see what it was about. Forty-four pages later, I thought, "I think I'm going to read this even if it is three hundred and ninety-three pages long."

So what persuaded me? Well, for one thing I was reminded of one of my favorite books from many years ago, William Brinkley's The Fun House, which is about behind-the-scenes goings on at a large publisher like Time-Life. Croaked! is about a different kind of publisher, Ogle, which is a lot like Playboy, and the people who work there are just as goofy as those in The Fun House, if not goofier. For another thing, the book's set in the 1960s, a time I remember with affection. and then there's the first murder. How many books have you read lately where someone's killed by a giant frog?

Croaked! is fast and funny, and it doesn't seem long at all. Check it out.