The Howard Hughes Affair

On the eve of Pearl Harbor, Howard Hughes hires Hollywood gumshoe Toby Peters to find stolen blueprints in the “marvelously entertaining” series (Newsday).

Millionaire Howard Hughes likes his secrets. He likes to keep them—and he definitely doesn’t like having them stolen. Hollywood PI Toby Peters has a rep for being discreet. So when the film tycoon and aviation magnate needs a detective to very privately investigate the theft of top-secret blueprints taken from his home during one of his fabulous parties, he summons Peters. But what starts as counter-espionage intrigue turns into a triple murder, and Peters soon finds himself bait for a killer.

As America is pulled into World War II, Peters is just trying to stay alive as a gunman chases him through a deserted television soundstage. With help from some unlikely allies—including Basil Rathbone, the silver screen’s Sherlock Holmes, and gangster/patriot Bugsy Siegel—Peters is determined to dodge the bullets long enough to recover the blueprints before they fall into the wrong hands.

The Chicago Sun-Times calls the Toby Peters mysteries “entertainment at its best” as Edgar Award–winning author Stuart Kaminsky takes readers on a rollicking tour of Hollywood in the forties.