Customer Reviews

Hollywood Stuff: A Jane Wheel Mystery

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In Fiffer's fifth "Stuff," our Jane Wheel, PPI (Picker, Private Investigator,) has left the Friendly Confines of Illinois for the Left Coast. What a Grand opportunity to rummage through Hollywood - and maybe even find the stolen Ruby Slippers! This reviewer has previously raved that if you are frenzied over Fire-King, bonkers over Bakelite, cuckoo over kitsch, or otherwise silly over vintage stuff, you'll want to collect these charmingly murderous mysteries. Afficianadas of The Grand Quest will find more murderous fun than a year of yard sales.

But Fiffer's fifth is a Sale Bill that looks good, yet doesn't quite deliver. Maybe because she's out of her Illinois element, maybe because this is much more character than collectible-driven, Hollywood Stuff is just a pleasant afternoon browsing the Flea Market with old friends and new scoundrels. /TundraVision, Amazon Reviewer

At about 1/3 of the way through (just after Jane finds the corpse), I put the book down. I went to pick it up again, stopped, and decided, "I'm not reading any further. I just don't care." The characters/setting are overdone. Moreoever, Tim has become so stereotypically gay. And what airline serves Grey Goose (with stuffed olives!) in First anymore? Count yourself lucky to get an extra lime with your Finlandia.
A note to folks considering reading this one: it will help a great deal to re-read the previous one first. The "plot" involves remembering details of that book, which came out over a year ago.

This is new territory for Jane. Literally. The action takes place in Hollywood, with Tim and Detective Oh included. Jane's detective skills are improving, and even though her picker's instincts are thriving, she manages mostly on her own to get to the bottom of this convoluted tale. Old friends and memories conspire to trip her up, but Jane pulls through. Her recall of Oh's instructions repeatedly guide her. This is a great read, and the change of locale is great, the seduction of LA offers new temptations for Jane. I'm glad she went, but I'm glad too she is going home. This is a great addition to the Jane Wheel series.

Hollywood movie producer and owner of Bix Pix Flix Wren "Bix" Bixby watches collectibles seller Jane Wheel on a newsmagazine show discuss her solving the murder of Johnny Sullivan. Bix thinks Jane's tale as a part-time amateur sleuth would make a great movie so she calls Jane, who agrees to have her investigation filmed.

Jane and her best friend media curious Tim Lowry fly to California to consult with Bix who knows her college boyfriend, Jeb Gleason; he and Bix are old buddies too. While discussing Jane's scarecrow investigation, an explosion occurs in a prop room injuring Bix, who is taken to a nearby hospital. Not long afterward someone stabs the person Jane assumes is Bix's business partner at a flea market they both were visiting. Unable to resist, Jane investigates the crime wave devastating the Indie studio.

Not so ironically in her fifth appearance, Jane is at her best sleuthing for a Hollywood star, a collectible or a killer rather than playing the Hollywood scene where she seems more like a fifth wheel. Though the Los Angeles based part of the cast comes across less than two dimensional Jane is terrific whether she seeks Danny DeVito, a bargain, or a murderer.

Harriet Klausner