Plugged

Irish author Colfer, best known for his middle-grade Artemis Fowl series, makes his much anticipated crime novel debut with this pitch-perfect comic noir. Daniel McEvoy, an Irish army veteran turned doorman at a sleazy New Jersey casino, lives alone in an apartment (underneath a psychotic woman with a penchant for foul-mouthed tirades) and consumes copious amounts of Jameson. Obsessed with his thinning hair, he secretly undergoes hair transplant treatments. Then Connie, a cocktail hostess with whom McEvoy once had a romantic fling, is shot dead in the casino parking lot, and he suddenly finds himself on the run from the cops, a local mob boss, and a smitten psychopath with a thing for casseroles. In a typical display of mordant wit, Colfer describes a thug with a burst kidney as "writhing on the ground like an ageing break-dancer." Outrageous characters (McEvoy's boss is "a cross between Al Pacino, P. Diddy and Elmer Fudd"), uproariously funny plot twists, and brutal, nonstop action make this a sure-fire winner. 10-city author tour. (Aug.)