Crime Novelist Enthusiast Gifts

'I wonder how much smog we breathe in each day.'

We're here at House of Java cafe at an all-too-familiar scene. House of Java.net Cybercafe. Tommy Jones, a local boy, has been caught stealing a scone. A minor offense? Not to the cafe's proprietor. He's demanding the boy be sentenced as an adult. But I'm eight! Wahhh! Add a year to the sentence for whining and crying.

Sherlock Holmes selling Sherlock Holmes.

Round up all the king's horses and all the king's men for questioning.

"Talk, Wallace - where'd you hide the loot?"

"That's her - that's the girl who broke into our house! But her hair was 'goldier'."

It was my story. A murder mystery. A who-done-it-and-got-away-with-it-until-he-wrote-about-it.

The Philip Marlow family

'I'm sure that the autopsy will confirm it was a suicide.'

'Mark my word, Walters, this is no ordinary virus.'

'Who was the murderer? Well Watson, that's the killer question.'

"So, just to be clear: the 'voices inside your head' told you to launder the money from forfeited law enforcement seizures in exchange for federal tax breaks for your Uncle Mark in Costa Rica?"

"And just how do you expect to become a made man, son, without a solid liberal-arts education?"

"You're not grandma at all! In fact, I think this is a case of identity theft!"

"Then leave the horses head in the Futon." Middle-class mafia

"I've been dumping bodies here for years, and it seems to me that the sea level is rising."

I always forget - Are we supposed to tip?

'I don't care how you do it...just make it look like an accident.'

'I don't know officer: They all look alike to me...'

'During the break, my client stole my wallet.'

Mafia Short-Term Memory Clinic. 'Fuhgettaboutit.'

Police outline artist training academy: the intro 101 class.

"I'll never understand it. I followed the generally accepted principles of embezzling."

Dog detectives

"Undiagnosed serial killer"

Fish mobsters.

"Say, Chief, any progress on the pencil case?"

Cosa Nostradamus: "Listen, you mook. I predict if you don't pay the vig to the Don by tonight you'll be at the bottom of the Hudson by morning."

"Paper or plastic?"

"Now don't do anything flashy with the money, like pay off all your student loans at once."

'Try to think of this as a learning experience.'

The old good-cop, psycho-cop routine.

"I did, boss, I swear, I buried him myself."

"By Ned, you're right, inspector—the body has been moved."

"Damn it—I told them I was too well known for undercover work!"