Hounds of the Hollywood Baskervilles: A Babs Norman Hollywood Mystery
Private eye Babs Norman and her partner Guy Brandt are wrestling with a feral, flea-infested cat and a box of kittens when the 1940s star of Sherlock Holmes films, Basil Rathbone, enters the veterinary clinic and reports that he’s lost his red cocker spaniel, Leo. Soon, another dog, the terrier known as Asta in the Nick and Nora Charles’ Thin Man series, goes missing. Then, it’s the Wizard of Oz’s Toto, too.
A retainer from Rathbone and promise of a reward from MGM put Babs on the trail of the dog-nappers and lead her and her associate to galas, dog shows, the Brown Derby, and film studio lots where they mix with the likes of Dashiell Hammett, William Powell, Myrna Loy, Rathbone’s wife Ouida, and the mysterious countess whose last name translates to Revenge—Velma von Rache.
Hounds of the Hollywood Baskervilles is the first in Crowens’ new Babs Norman series. Crowens is known for the three-book Time Traveler Professor Series that pairs Arthur Conan Doyle and John Patrick Scott, an investigator of the paranormal and time traveler. Here, Crowens highlights Conan Doyle’s frequent use of dogs in Holmes’ mysteries, including Sherlock’s tests of suspicious pills on his landlady’s terrier in “The Study in Scarlet,” the bloodhound Toby’s sense of scent in “The Sign of Four,” and the hellhound threatening Henry Baskerville.
Scenes capture the glamour of Tinseltown in the prewar years and drop hints of chicanery and sabotage by aggressive German operatives. Action does not flow smoothly, however, because of unnecessary complications and sidetracks. Dialogue and interactions are often testy, and more time seems to be spent on descriptions of attire and wardrobe than on sniffing out and tracking clues. Readers observe, but do not have the chance to participate in the action.
