The Promise was published by Putnam in 2015, a crossover novel combining the Elvis Cole/Joe Pike series with the characters from Crais’s standalone novel Suspect (2013) — LAPD K-9 officer Scott James and his bomb-detection dog Maggie.
Amy Breslyn, an employee of a defense contractor, disappears after apparently stealing military explosives. Cole is hired by a friend to find her. Simultaneously, Scott James and Maggie are called to a scene where traces of explosive are detected. The two investigations converge on the same conspiracy: stolen RDEX (a fictional military explosive) is being sold to domestic extremists.
Crais uses the crossover structure to expand his Los Angeles canvas — Cole’s PI world, Pike’s underworld connections, and the institutional LAPD represented by James all approach the same problem from different angles. The novel also showcases Crais’s gift for writing animal consciousness: Maggie’s sections, rendered in her sensory perspective (smell-dominated, loyalty-driven), are among the most technically accomplished animal POV passages in crime fiction.
Collecting The Promise
First edition (Putnam, New York, 2015): Boards with dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine in jacket: $10–$15
- Signed first: $20–$40