Umbrella Man, the latest and possibly funniest Flippo installment, introduces Jack as a dutiful boyfriend. He’s at Mr. Mike’s Adult Books & Video picking up an assortment of blow-up dolls for his tattooed girlfriend, Lola. (Now, don’t get the wrong idea -- she’s using them for a soon-be-created conceptual art exhibit entitled: The Nuclear Love Family.)

Later, a con artist who makes money off the Kennedy assassination by leading tours in a "you-are-there JFK death mobile" publicly announces that Jack Flippo is looking for the "Umbrella Man" film, a film missing since 1963 that proves President Kennedy was fired upon by a second gunnman. In a response to his publicity stunt, Jack immediately insists that he is neither looking for, nor believes such a film exists. But regardless, the announcement seems to draw out all the crackpots. This includes a dim-witted, white-trash Texan who likes to urinate on just about everything.

But when the cranks get serious and Jack is attacked in his law office and loses his job, he's forced to return to his previous occupation as a private investigator and to solve the question of whether or not the film exists. This proves all the more difficut since his girlfriend is too busy buying accessories for her blow-up dolls to take any safety precautions.

I can’t imagine finding an author that writes funnier detective fiction than Edgar-nominated, Golden Dagger-winning Doug Swanson. His characters are quirky, the dialogue is funny and honest, and, best yet, the plotting is carefully complex.

Jack Flippo has just the right mix of cynicism and smarts to make him one of the best series characters of the year.

--Whitney Rose Anderson