The Screaming Buddha — Robert J. Bowman

After his gritty and suspenseful first novel, The House of Blue Lights, Robert J. Bowman here offers up a very different, funny mystery. That's obvious from the start, where we find his hero, Checker cab driver Jack Squire, making the rounds of conventions in his native San Francisco deciding where to scam a free lunch. Squire is a small-time con artist with a Filofax in his head and an eye for the main chance. In this instance it's a huge shipping container of unknown contents and no visible owner, just begging for some less-than-scrupulous entrepreneur to come along and hook it up to his borrowed Mack truck. Who knows what it might hold?
Jack's big score turns out to be box after box of fat, grinning, rubber Buddhas that scream when you squeeze the stomach. He can't unload the "spontaneously acquired merchandise" through any of his usual contacts, but all of a sudden he's attracted the attention of both the cops and some ruffians decidedly less amiable than poor Jack.
Trying to untangle the mess he's in, Squire finds himself in the middle of a massive smuggling ring with interested parties coming at him from every direction. The ensuing chase will leave readers torn between suspense and laughter and finding they can accommodate both.