Actor (Stanley Hastings Mystery, #8) [Kindle Edition]

Parnell Hall (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Stanley Hastings is a frenzied PI whose six comic misadventures while investigating accident cases for a Manhattan law firm have been chronicled in Shot , Detective et al. Having interviewed people with broken legs and photographed holes in the sidewalks for 20 years, Stanley has nearly forgotten that he was an aspiring actor before he took up detecting. He's overjoyed when an old theater chum asks him to step into a production of Shaw's Arms and the Man in the wilds of Connecticut just two short days before opening. There he runs afoul of a persnickety stage manager and the arrogant no-talent, soap opera-trained star and gets to share a dressing room with a young actress of few inhibitions. When the stage manager is stabbed to death, Stanley must call on his real-life skills to extricate himself from the role of leading suspect. Removed from his urban setting, Stanley stumbles through a few uncharacteristically slow moments, but soon he is up to his painted face in leads, tangled motives and cold sweat as he faces a matinee audience, planning to resolve the case with a surprising deviation from the Shavian script. The standing ovation is well-deserved.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

Ambulance-chasing shamus and long-ago amateur thespian Stanley Hastings (Juror, Shot, etc.) runs up to Connecticut to help out his old college friend Herbert Drake by taking over the role of Bluntschli, in Arms and the Man, from the late Walter Penbridge. Opening night, which Stanley miraculously survives, is marred when he discovers the corpse of stage manager Goobie Wheatly, who had loudly humiliated him just the day before--so that he naturally becomes friendly local Chief Bob's chief suspect, beating out even such competitors as hammy TV actor Avery Allington and leading lady Margie Miller, whose amorous exploits can't leave her much time to sleep. The usual Hastings formula--mystery-mongering with amusingly lowbrow byplay substituting for detection. Middling for the series. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 435 KB
• Publisher: Parnell Hall (September 29, 2010)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B00457XFLK
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #95,995 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
  • #3 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Arts & Entertainment > Theater > Direction & Production
  • #26 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Arts & Entertainment > Theater > Acting & Auditioning

More About the Author

Parnell Hall's music video, KING OF KINDLE, is on his Amazon author page! Cameos by Lawrence Block, Mary Higgins Clark, and dozens of other mystery writers. See how many you can spot. (Scroll down for video)

Parnell is the author of the Puzzle Lady crossword puzzle mysteries, set in the fictitious town of Bakerhaven, Connecticut. Cora Felton, the Puzzle Lady, has a nationally syndicated crossword puzzle column, but couldn't construct a puzzle if her life depended on it. Her niece Sherry Carter writes the column for her. The much married Miss Felton is much happier solving crime. She made her debut in 1999 in A CLUE FOR THE PUZZLE LADY, and has since romped through LAST PUZZLE & TESTAMENT, PUZZLED TO DEATH, and A PUZZLE IN A PEAR TREE, WITH THIS PUZZLE, I THEE KILL, AND A PUZZLE TO DIE ON, and STALKING THE PUZZLE LADY. Cora is herself a suspect in YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN PUZZLED.

Though poor at words, Cora proves most adept at numbers in THE SUDOKU PUZZLE MURDERS. New York Times crossword puzzle editor Will Shortz constructed the sudoku puzzles that help solve the mystery. Sudoku puzzles also play a part in DEAD MAN'S PUZZLE, and THE PUZZLE LADY VS. THE SUDOKU LADY. Cora tackles a new number puzzle in THE KENKEN KILLINGS.

As research for the Puzzle Lady books, Parnell competed in the National Crossword Puzzle Tournament in Stamford, Connecticut, where out of a field of 254 contestants he finished 250th, just ahead of the four people who failed to turn in a paper. Parnell composed the puzzles for his earlier books. He now has them created by New York Times constructor Manny Nosowsky, and edited by National Tournament winner Ellen Ripstein.

Parnell also writes the Stanley Hastings mystery novels, and the Steve Winslow courtroom dramas. His first novel, DETECTIVE, was nominated for an Edgar award by the Mystery Writers of America, and a Shamus award by the Private Eye Writers of America. His tenth Stanley Hastings novel, MOVIE, was nominated for a Shamus award for Best Private Eye Novel of 1995, and for a Lefty for the funniest mystery novel of 1995. Recently, Stanley and his wife Alice vacationed at a New England bed-and-breakfast in COZY, a takeoff on that subset of the genre; the book is full of recipes and the cat solves the crime. Stanley returned to the mean streets of Manhattan in MANSLAUGHTER, HITMAN, and CAPER. He has his first paranormal encounter in the short story DEATH OF A VAMPIRE, in the Charlaine Harris anthology, CRMIES BY MOONLIGHT.

Parnell worked for two years as a private detective in New York City. His experiences form the basis for his Stanley Hastings series. He has no courtroom experience, however, and owes his Steve Winslow series to a childhood spent reading Erle Stanley Gardner.

Parnell is an actor, who has done summer stock and regional theater, and appeared in a number of movies, including Arnold Schwarzenegger's first movie, Hercules in New York (in which he appeared clad in a leopard skin) and A New Leaf with Elaine May and Walter Matthau.

Parnell is a member of the Writers Guild of America East with several screenplays to his credit, including the underground horror movie C.H.U.D., which has been satirized on Saturday Night Live, the Simpsons, Pushing Daisies, The Dailey Show, and The Colbert Report.

Parnell's career as a professional songwriter began at the age of sixteen, when Pete Seeger sang The Literacy Test Song on the Folkways album, Gazette, Volume 2. Parnell has performed his songs at several mystery conventions, including the Edgar Awards, Magna Cum Murder, Malice Domestic, and the Bouchercon. This year he is performing The Ballad of Alferd Packard,
a song celebrating Denver's most famous cannibal, at the Left Coast Crime banquet.

Parnell Hall is a former President of the Private Eye Writers of America, and a member of Sisters in Crime. He lives in New York City.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stanley Hastings is an adorable sleuth, January 30, 2002

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Actor (Hardcover)

I am in the process of collecting all of the Stanley Hastings books in hardcover. I have read them all and he is the most entertaining sleuth in the business. His reluctance at being drawn into the mystery makes the plots all the more irresistable and as a result, they are not predictable. He makes me laugh out loud...never have I read a more charming character.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Among the very best of the Stanley Hastings series, February 6, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Actor (Paperback)

I have read at least five other books featuring the unique Stanley Hastings, but this one is special because of the different setting. Instead of his usual ambulance-chasing, Stanley gets to play a major part in a production of "Arms and the Man". I had read the play long ago, and that added to my enjoyment of the book. Rarely has a protagonist risen so triumphantly over countless humiliating circumstances; you have to admire the almost masochistic determination of actors who put up with all he describes in hilarious, but still almost depressing detail. Ambulance-chasing in the Bronx seems a picnic compared to Stanley's experiences in this book.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious!, March 18, 2000

By 

Christina P. Branson "Strixaluco" (Fort Collins) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Actor (Paperback)

PI Stanley Hastings is called by an old college buddy to fill in for an actor who died right before opening night of ARMS AND THE MAN in a tiny New England town. The stage manager promptly gets himself murdered, and Stanley has to help Chief Bob (an amateur actor himself) find the killer. The search is a comically depressing examination of backstage life and midlife crisis that leaves the reader amazed at Stanley's emotional resilience.

The amount of theatrical detail Hall included was impressive, and I enjoyed his use of internal dialogue, which ranks right up there with Lawrence Block's. And it's the rare mystery author who can sneak a Pinter joke into the dialogue like Hall does. I did find Stanley's hang-up on the spelling of the word "actor" mildly distracting, but it would take an awful lot more than that to detract from the fun of this book.