Murder Unscripted

January 2, 2012
Despite Rosengren’s experience as a TV and film actor, his first novel fails to impress either as a realistic look at contemporary Hollywood or as a mystery. The demise of diva actress Elaine Weddington, found dead in her dressing room with an empty medicine bottle beside her, jeopardizes the completion of her current movie project, Flames of Desire. By chance, the company holding the completion bond on the picture retains her ex-husband, Eddie Collins, a struggling actor and a part-time PI, to investigate. The victim’s prickly personality means there’s no shortage of suspects, but the sleuthing is strictly by the book. Even another murder doesn’t do much to increase the suspense, and the setting of the climax on a cliff gives away much of what will transpire. Hopefully, Rosengren will provide a more complicated plot and better drawn characters in his next Eddie Collins whodunit.