Idle Gossip
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5.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Gossip columnist Lorna Whitcomb knows every dirty secret in Hollywood . . . except who killed her tipster. Sleuthing duo Lillian Frost and Edith Head investigate in this head-turning mystery.
1940, Los Angeles. Hollywood’s famous gossip columnist, Lorna Whitcomb, has summoned Lillian Frost and her sleuthing partner, costume designer extraordinaire Edith Head, to her office. Lorna’s ‘leg man’ Sam Simcoe – the man who finds the scandalous material for her column – is in trouble. Tipster Glenn Hoyle has been murdered, and Sam is the LAPD’s only suspect. But Sam didn’t just find Glenn’s body when he paid him a visit. Hiding in a wastebasket was a list of three names – a starlet, a producer and a director – and Sam’s sure Glenn had an explosive story on all of them. Was it just idle gossip, or could it explain his murder?
Lorna wants Edith and Lillian to find Glenn’s killer before her powerful enemies strike. In a town full of secrets, Edith and Lillian must expose the dirtiest one of all: who killed Glenn Hoyle?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Patrick's solid fifth Hollywood mystery (after 2021's The Sharpest Needle) finds Lillian Frost, social secretary to wealthy movie maven Addison Rice, and Edith Head, Oscar-winning costume designer for Paramount Pictures, drawn into the cutthroat world of gossip columnists. In 1940, Lorna Whitcomb, a top chronicler of Hollywood happenings, asks Lillian and Edith to help clear Sam Simcoe, her main source of salacious material for her column. Sam is suspect number one in the murder of tipster Glenn Hoyle, who occasionally passed Sam juicy tidbits. The only clue as to who might have had a motive to kill Glenn is a list of three names found at the crime scene, those of "a starlet on the rise, a producer with a paucity of credits, and a director the world had forgotten." Star turns by the likes of Barbara Stanwyck, Bing Crosby, and Count Oleg Cassini, who may be in line for Edith's job, help compensate for a plot that's less gripping than Patrick's usual. A bonus is the concluding author's note that reveals the actual (and often outlandish) events that inspired elements in the story. Hollywood history buffs will have fun.
