Dancing in the Dark
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
A PI performs some fancy footwork to protect Fred Astaire as “Edgar winner Kaminsky effortlessly choreographs Hollywood history . . . and dirty doings” (Publishers Weekly).
Sometimes fools must step in where Fred Astaire fears to tap.
Luna Martin, the moll of a well-known Los Angeles gangster nicknamed “Fingers” (because he likes to cut them off), has demanded dance lessons from Hollywood’s finest hoofer—and whatever Luna wants, Luna gets.
To sidestep the flirtations of the lead-footed lady, Astaire hires private investigator Toby Peters to pose as a dance instructor and take over the lessons. But when someone cuts in and cuts Luna’s throat, the grieving gangster makes Peters an offer he can’t refuse: Find the killer—or go from having two left feet to one foot in the grave.
Now, instead of punishing the parquet, the silver screen’s most famous song-and-dance man is pounding the pavement with his new partner—a rumpled, middle-aged gumshoe who just wants to live to shuffle through another day . . .
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Even Fred Astaire can't dance his way out of trouble without help from Toby Peters, detective to the stars in wartime Hollywood. In Toby's 19th entertaining case (after Tomorrow is Another Day), mob moll Luna Martin wants dance lessons. Her boyfriend, nicknamed ``Fingers'' because he removes those of his enemies, invites the great dancer to instruct Luna--or suffer bodily harm. After Luna bats her eyelashes once too often at the star, however, a nervous Astaire, fearing wrathful Fingers, hires Toby to stand in. But Toby doesn't ``know a tango from a funeral march.'' The disappointed Luna complains, but not for long; someone cuts her throat. As the bodies pile up, Toby also struggles with his ex-wife's decision to marry a B-movie actor and takes poundings from an enigmatic legbreaker named Kudlap Singh, formerly a professional wrestler known as the Beast of Bombay. Clues lead to a star-filled benefit at L.A.'s historic Wiltern Theatre, where danger lurks when Astaire takes the stage. As always in this engaging series, Edgar-winner Kaminsky effortlessly choreographs Hollywood history, colorful cast and dirty doings.
