Hollywood Hills: A Novel - Softcover

Wambaugh, Joseph

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0446584088 ISBN 13: 9780446584081

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing, 2011

Synopsis

The legendary Hollywood Hills are home to wealth, fame, and power--passing through the neighborhood, it's hard not to get a little greedy.

LAPD veteran "Hollywood Nate" Weiss could take or leave the opulence, but he wouldn't say no to onscreen fame. He may get his shot when he catches the appreciative eye of B-list director Rudy Ressler, and his troublemaking fiancée, Leona Brueger, the older-but-still-foxy widow of a processed-meat tycoon. Nate tries to elude her crafty seductions, but consents to keep an eye on their estate in the Hollywood Hills while they're away.

Also minding the mansion is Raleigh Dibble, a hapless ex-con trying to put the past behind him. Raleigh is all too happy to be set up for the job--as butler-cum-watchdog--by Nigel Wickland, Leona's impeccably dressed art dealer. What Raleigh doesn't realize is that under the natty clothes and posh accent, Nigel has a nefarious plan: two paintings hanging on the mansion's walls will guarantee them more money than they've ever seen.

Everyone's dreams are just within reach--the only problem is, this is Hollywood. A circle of teenage burglars that the media has dubbed The Bling Ring has taken to pillaging the homes of Hollywood celebutants like Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, and when a pair of drug-addled young copycats stumbles upon Nigel's heist, that's just the beginning of the disaster to come. Soon Hollywood Nate, surfer cops Flotsam and Jetsam, and the rest of the team at Hollywood Station have a deadly situation on their hands.

Hollywood Hills is a raucous and dangerous roller coaster ride that showcases Joseph Wambaugh in vintage form.

About this title

About the Author

Joseph Wambaugh, a former LAPD detective sergeant, is the bestselling author of 19 prior works of fiction and nonfiction, including The Choirboys and The Onion Field. In 2004, he was named Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America. He lives in southern California.

From Booklist

Wambaugh runs the same plays that he’s used repeatedly in his Hollywood series of cop novels, jumping between the lives of street people, the ridiculously wealthy denizens of the Hollywood Hills, and the cops who careen among them. This series has several cop stars, including “Hollywood Nate” Weiss, who has a SAG card and is actively pursuing a movie career, and a pair of surfer cops, known as Flotsam and Jetsam. As usual, Wambaugh gives the reader a lot of street action and one showcased plotline. This time, the cops come into contact (through Hollywood Nate) with a B-movie director, his Botoxed girlfriend, and a ring of teen burglars targeting upscale homes. The highly entertaining plotting is offset this time by Styrofoam characters and unlikely dialogue. Fans expect Wambaugh to give them actual cop talk, but he misfires here, giving his cops lines like “gymnosophical gyrations of that slammin’ speaker.” In addition, the opening scene is needlessly pornographic; Wambaugh doesn’t need to try to get readers’ attention this way. A good novel but not at all representative of what Wambaugh can do. --Connie Fletcher

About this edition

• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0446584088
• ISBN 13: 9780446584081
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 448