Dorothy Parker Murder CA-Op/11

by George Baxt

Book Overview

The first of three crime novels featuring well-known literary and theatrical figures of the 1920s and 30s written by the winner of a special Edgar in the States for "A Parade of Cockeyed Creatures",... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0930330366
• ISBN13: 9780930330361
• Release Date: April 1986
• Publisher: International Polygonics
• Length: 284 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Bathtub Gin, Bootleg Liquor and Speakeasies!

This is a very good example of a noir detective story. In it we meet a lot of real people from the Roaring Twenties entertainment crowd. The mystery is sketched around Rudolph Valentino's death, but we see the real people that lived in and around his circle. It is clear that Baxt knew some of these people since he writes about them as an old friend might. He has a witty, breezy style, and he perfectly captures the way of life of Prohibition New York. The story takes place in the summer of 1926, just a few days afer Valentino's sudden death. We meet Dorothy Parker and the rest of her Algonquin crew as they join forces with the cops to solve the murder of a dead showgirl. There is a lot of organized crime in the story, and we get a clear picture of how they operated, the front men that they set up and the way they dealt with traitors. (Even cement shoes show up in the book). I really enjoyed this book, and Baxt is an accomplished writer.

This smart/funny book captures Ms. P's wit/cynicism

If you like a mystery that makes you both laugh and think, you have to read at least one of G. Baxt's celebrity sleuth novels. This is one of my favorites because he really captures D. Parker's legendary personality to create an intriguing mystery around Rudolph Valentino's death. Nothing seems forced in this novel; G. Baxt adroitly weaves together fact and fiction to create three-dimensional characters based on some of the most interesting celebrities of the past, including some of the most notable members of the Algonquin Round Table of The New Yorker magazine fame. And some of the dialog he has given D. Parker seems so genuine to her public persona that it's almost as though he knew her.