The Donut Legion

A Novel

Contributors

By Joe R. Lansdale

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Price

$14.99

Price

$19.99 CAD

This item is a preorder. Your payment method will be charged immediately, and the product is expected to ship on or around March 21, 2023. This date is subject to change due to shipping delays beyond our control.

In this standalone, Edgar-award winning author, Joe R. Lansdale, whom "few can match" (Booklist) beams a light on an East Texas town where a QAnon-style, evangelist cult is brewing trouble. 

Charlie Garner has a bad feeling. His ex-wife, Meg, has been missing for over a week and one quick peek into her home shows all her possessions packed up in boxes. Neighbors claim she’s running from bill collectors, but Charlie suspects something more sinister is afoot. Meg was last seen working at the local donut shop, a business run by a shadow group most refer to as ‘The Saucer People’; a space-age, evangelist cult who believe their compound to be the site of an extraterrestrial Second Coming.
 
Along with his brother, Felix, and beautiful, randy journalist Amelia “Scrappy” Moon, Charlie uncovers strange and frightening details about the compound (read: a massive, doomsday storehouse of weapons, a leashed chimpanzee!) When the body of their key informer is found dead with his arms ripped out of their sockets, Charlie knows he’s in danger but remains dogged in his quest to rescue Meg.
 
Brimming with colorful characters and Lansdale’s characteristic bounce, this rollicking crime novel examines the insidious rise of fringe groups and those under their sway with black comedy and glints of pathos.

  • "A breathlessly paced, suspenseful novel, revealing the dark underbelly of cults, and people's enduring fascination with the supernatural. Populated by his one-of-a-kind characters, Lansdale, with his signature humor and empathy, peels back the layers of bluster and hype, exposing the seductive and dangerous nature of predatory sects.”
    Kathleen Kent, author of THE DIME
  • "The Donut Legion struck a crazy chord in my heart. Joe Lansdale employs his signature dark humor to shine a supremely strange and unflinchingly honest light on our present-day madness. Known for his colorful characters, Lansdale outdoes himself with this motley crew. Fingers crossed more Garner Brother books are on the way!"
    Eli Cranor, author of DON’T KNOW TOUGH
  • “Joe R. Lansdale’s THE DONUT LEGION centers around a writer searching for his missing ex-wife with the help of his private dick brother and a wannabe journalist, diving headlong into the bowels of a flying-saucer cult and their sketchy donut shop front. It’s a full-tilt blast, shot through with Lansdale’s searching humanism and deft touch. His East Texas brims with weirdness. Vibrant and rowdy and just so much damn fun. I’ve lost faith in a lot of people and things and institutions over the years, but I’ve never lost faith in Lansdale’s books, and this is one of his best yet.”    
     
    William Boyle, author of SHOOT THE MOONLIGHT OUT
  • "Whether in his celebrated Hap and Leonard series or in many fine stand-alones (Moon Lake, 2021), Lansdale has always displayed a master chef's hand at blending genre and tone—horror, crime, coming-of-age realism, black humor—into perfectly emulsified, tasty entrées... Mixing horror and thriller is fairly commonplace these days, but few can match Lansdale at finding wit and tenderness bobbing along in the wake of the gore."
    Bill Ott, Booklist
  • "I plan to enjoy this East Texas farce to the fullest, in which the investigation of a missing woman leads to a cult-owned donut shop, a doomsday compound, and a leashed gorilla, among many other Terrible Sights and Strange Happenings."
    Crimereads
  • "dollops of Lansdale’s trademark off-speed humor"
    Kirkus Reviews
  • "As usual, Lansdale's prose is tight, he has laced his highly entertaining story with sly humor, and he has populated it with a cast of quirky characters. This time, they include a brutish, 7-foot-tall arsonist, a cantankerous sheriff, a loveable police dog named Tag, and a cowboy-hat-wearing chimpanzee who rips people's arms off."
    Bruce DeSilva, Associated Press

On Sale
Mar 21, 2023
Page Count
288 pages
Publisher
Mulholland Books
ISBN-13
9780316540674

Joe R. Lansdale

About the Author

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of nearly four dozen novels, including Rusty Puppy, the Edgar-award winning The Bottoms, Sunset and Sawdust, and Leather Maiden. He has received nine Bram Stoker Awards, the American Mystery Award, the British Fantasy Award, and the Grinzane Cavour Prize for Literature. He lives with his family in Nacogdoches, Texas.

Learn more about this author