Hollywood Hills

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.--Fletcher, Connie Copyright 2010 Booklist

The LAPD's Hollywood Station deals with some of the strangest lawbreakers anywhere, as shown in MWA Grand Master Wambaugh's amusing fourth novel to feature Hollywood Nate Weiss, surfer cops Flotsam and Jetsam, and the rest of the series' colorful police crew (after Hollywood Moon). In the main plot line, the paths of a pair of drug-addled thieves-high school dropout Jonas Claymore and his down-on-her-luck housemate, Megan Burke-converge and collide with those of snooty art dealer Nigel Wickland and sleazy part-time butler Raleigh L. Dibble with results both absurd and tragic. Meanwhile, Wambaugh diverts with smaller episodes about such odd Hollywood denizens as the Wedgie Bandit and the Goths, a couple whose dress and house channels the Addams family. Veteran police officer Della Ravelle's sage mentoring of young officer Britney Small lends some gravity to this deliciously convoluted caper. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Wambaugh's Hollywood trilogy (Hollywood Moon, 2009, etc.) sprouts a fourth volume, another offbeat mix of broadly satirical comedy and a cast of cops apparently waiting for a procedural that never kicks in.Veteran Officer "Hollywood" Nate Weiss, the only member of the LAPD with a Screen Actors Guild card, hopes that meeting second-tier director/producer Rudy Ressler might be his big break. Rudy wants Hollywood Nate to keep an eye on the art-stocked home of the late meatpacking king Sammy Brueger while Rudy's off in Tuscany with his fiance, Benny's widow Leona, who comes on to Hollywood Nate in a way that seems likely to seal the deal. Alas, the real action at the Brueger place has nothing to do with the movies. Beverly Hills art dealer Nigel Wickland, whom Leona invited out to inspect her security measures, has decided to steal two of Sammy's prize paintings and replace them with replicas. His plan requires him to embed an accomplice, ex-con caterer-turned-butler Raleigh L. Dibble, in Leona's household while she's away, ostensibly to tend her ancient brother-in-law Marty, but actually to provide Nigel access to the house. On the other side of the tracks, high-school dropout Jonas Claymore, too strung out on OxyContin to hold his job parking cars, schemes with his long-suffering housemate Megan Burke to improve his own standard of living by breaking into the homes of the wealthy. You'd never guess which home he picks, or when. The guardians of the law who've been invited to this Hiaasen-esque carnival of criminal losers seem like outsiders, and that may be just the point. Hollywood Nate, his old buddy Snuffy Salcedo, probationary Officer Britney Small, her Field Training Officer Della Ravelle, surfer cops Flotsam and Jetsamall of them do precious little detection or investigation, but a couple of them discharge their service weapons to significant effect.Though everything takes forever to happen, the laughs are authentic, and a couple of endearing heroes emerge. A middling entry in this waggish series.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.