What is "a rhumba in waltz time" anyway? Those musically inclined may recognize a rhumba as a dance performed in 4/4 time, and a waltz, a dance performed in 3/4 time. For those otherwise lost, let this suffice: if you've got a rhumba going on in waltz time, you're not playing by the rules.

Which, by the way, "A Rhumba in Waltz Time" by Robert S. Levinson, does very well. The action kicks, the suspense hangs, Hollywood is Hollywood, the characters don't play by the rules.

So this argument is not convincing. Kicking, hanging, Hollywood sounds nice; where are you taking it? A rhumba in waltz time, which sounded a little offensive, sounds now a bit conventional, a bit humdrum.

And it is, as long as you can call Hollywood conspiracies, corrupt law enforcement, overblown celebrity figures, and murder --all in a vertiginous span of time --conventional and humdrum.

Chris Blanchard is our protagonist; he plays the role faithfully. He drinks admirably, and he hates marijuana. He does the right thing, always, even if the right thing is a wrong thing. He is the guy you are supposed to like, perhaps the normal one, in the midst of Hollywood chaos. He does the right thing in the plot, but also for the plot. So he could be that cool guy to laugh at when you talk to him on the city bus, but you aren't the only one wishing you touched something when you slosh through some words, walk through characters, taste Blanchard's tasteless rye. Levinson's "Golden Age" Hollywood turns out a bit translucent or perhaps like every golden age, seems to turn out to be a gilded age, so you might find yourself scraping through three hundred pages of sheet metal.

But a thriller is a thriller! Its purpose is to thrill, and not to badger the public with sophistries and grand conceptions. Of course that is so, but there is a point in the sensational drama where the blood, sex, drugs, and lies come to a futile juncture, leaving the reader annoyed a little, or a bit queasy, because after three hundred pages your train of thought is so thoroughly derailed by the plot's bends and twists that they become redundant and a bit frustrating. It might not be a bad thing to disorient the reader a bit --we are dancing a rhumba in waltz time, right?-- but there's a line between doing so purposefully and leading the reader along by the dollar-on-a-string trick.

This book is enjoyable. Hollywood must have been a wild town in its day, and Los Angeles has always seemed to have an outlaw spirit. Levinson captures this in visceral scenery and engaging characters, translucent but not transparent. Fluid dialogue bears the brunt of the plot workings at a pace not too frenetic, and aside from some strange wordplays, it faithfully entertains. The plot itself, well, it begins and it ends. It was a Hollywood evoked with an anthropologist's thorough methodology that makes this a special read.

If sensationalism had a home, Hollywood would at least be its summer vacation. So a novel about Hollywood should have that lusty, mythological element. But even the sensational can become routine, conventional, and humdrum in its delivery; in effusing these elements perhaps intended to shock, this book played by the rules, which did not shock me. This book is engaging, but did it thrill? And around page 300, something seems old and complacent. The engagement gives way, the vivacity diminishes. Finishing the novel becomes the only concern, if that. There is room for more to be accomplished. So while this book is great entertainment, worth a recommendation to anyone interested, it ends up like the vice you would want to avoid for another few months.

Reach Miles here.