The book begins with the sudden death of a major movie star. Cecilia Cinvenueâs Ferrari careens off of a cliff in a remote St. Louis town. The only witness to this tragedy reveals that the actress claimed someone had been chasing her right before she died.
Ceciliaâs surprise revelation launches a police inquiry into the possibility of foul play. Det. Roberta Hobbs is assigned to lead the case. Hobbs is smart and independent, and no sooner does she take on this high-profile investigation than her brother appears from rural Missouri and drops his sullen fifteen-year-old son, Nick, in her lap.
Despite the sudden and demanding pressures of parenting, Hobbs gets right to work on the case. The more she learns about Cecilia, the more sheâs faced with the caseâs many twists and turns.
This novel takes us through both of the womenâs stories â Ceciliaâs in a past-tense narrative beginning with her motherâs aspirations of stardom, and Hobbsâs in present-day as she tries to get to the bottom of the case. It is a suspenseful page-turner, layered with character-focus, family drama, and a spotlight on breaking into the world of Hollywood.
The book begins with the sudden death of a major movie star. Cecilia Cinvenueâs Ferrari careens off of a cliff in a remote St. Louis town. The only witness to this tragedy reveals that the actress claimed someone had been chasing her right before she died.
Ceciliaâs surprise revelation launches a police inquiry into the possibility of foul play. Det. Roberta Hobbs is assigned to lead the case. Hobbs is smart and independent, and no sooner does she take on this high-profile investigation than her brother appears from rural Missouri and drops his sullen fifteen-year-old son, Nick, in her lap.
Despite the sudden and demanding pressures of parenting, Hobbs gets right to work on the case. The more she learns about Cecilia, the more sheâs faced with the caseâs many twists and turns.
This novel takes us through both of the womenâs stories â Ceciliaâs in a past-tense narrative beginning with her motherâs aspirations of stardom, and Hobbsâs in present-day as she tries to get to the bottom of the case. It is a suspenseful page-turner, layered with character-focus, family drama, and a spotlight on breaking into the world of Hollywood.
Vetta Park Light Industrial District
September 15, 2022
WHAT DID anyone really know about Cecilia Cinvenue? She was a beautiful, world-renowned actress. She was a performer, a box office rainmaker, a full-lipped, blonde-haired, long- legged ambassador of the arts...and now she was dead.
The world didnât know of her death of course â not at first. The first person to arrive at the scene was Dalton Beck. Beck worked at the quarry where Cinvenueâs Italian-engiâ neered sports car had landed after its vault over a jagged cliff.
Beck was a barrel of a man â thick, wide-sloped shoulders, full cheeks and a shiny bald head. He wore the same outfit to work every day: yellow helmet, bright orange blazer, ripped t- shirt and long jeans. On that day in mid-September, it was particularly warm for Eastern Missouri, and Beck was aggrieved to be hauling limestone and sediment under an unrelenting heat advisory warning. He had just gazed skyward to curse his situation when he heard the engine of Cinvenueâs cherry-red Ferrari.
Beck didnât know much about sports cars but he knew something was amiss, and it sounded like a fast-moving vehicle in some type of distress. The next few seconds occurred in a haze â so improbable, he was unable to process exactly what was occurring. First, he heard the gunning engine and then he saw the mesh of red and silver titanium plunge into the quarâ ryâs craggy rock â descending in the most violent, horrific way before finally coming to a stop just a few feet away from him.
Beck stood silently at the scene, staring at the car, his mouth ajar, his legs wobbly. He was sufficient to just stand there and take it all in â nearly frozen from this cryptic delivery from the heavens â when he heard the small, mousy cry from the driverâs seat.
âHelp,â the driver said softly. âHelp.â
Beck raced over and saw the petite woman crushed against the center console. Her hair was bloody and matted against her sweaty forehead. There was blood on the steering wheel, on her clothing and on the door. Dalton Beck had seen Cecilia Cinvenue on movie screens and red carpets numerous times throughout the past few decades but this woman looked like a mangled, battered version of the star.
Still, he knew it was Cecilia â perhaps by the way she stared at him with those familiar, anguished, eyes. Perhaps it was the way her unblemished skin blanched into a ghostlike pallor at the loss of blood. He had seen her tremendously successful action movie in the early 2000s, and all the bleached pancake makeup in the world couldnât hide her beauty. Then, just as now, Cecilia Cinvenue was stunning and vulnerable, and Beckâs every instinct commanded him to save her from this car. Especially now that the aroma of fuel was wafting into the air.
Unfortunately, Cecilia was trapped by a passenger door that wouldnât open â a crushed chassis that pinned her in the driverâs seat, obscuring her from the waist down.
âCecilia Cinvenue! Ok, maâam...I canât....I mean...Iâm gonna try to help you out...I mean...what happened?â Beck fumbled with words, while he ran to the passenger side to try another way to make the extraction. He was strong and deterâ mined, but the aluminum was just as stubborn as he was, and it proved unrelenting.
Beck peered through the shattered passenger window â his nostrils infused by the sweet benzene odor of leaking gas. It delivered an almost-immediate light-headedness that drove him a few steps backward.
Cecilia hadnât said a word since help but Beck acted as though she had. âWell, weâve got to get you out of there,â he said, knowing full well that there was no way he could get this woman out of her car. The prized, imported tour de force had become a metal straightjacket, preventing her from moving, wrapping its sharp alloys around her in a macabre embrace.
Beck was just pulling his cell phone from his pocket, just starting to dial the authorities, when Cecilia Cinvenue turned towards him and spoke her last words. Her eyes were glassy and her speech was garbled, but there was no mistaking what she said. These words would launch speculation and investigaâ tions â a wide-reaching inquiry by two police departments that plumbed the depths of Ceciliaâs tragically truncated life.
Cecilia spoke these words to the stranger standing three feet from her passenger door. Then the carâs engine erupted in flames. The fire licked and danced around Ceciliaâs body, eventually engulfing her in its blaring fireball.
By the time the authorities arrived, Cecilia Cinvenue was gone.
Detective Roberta Hobbs arrived at the scene roughly forty-five minutes after impact. She gripped the cruiserâs steering wheel while she navigated the main streets out of Vetta Parkâs residential areas and into its Light Industrial District.
The cruiserâs siren was wailing, its lights were flashing red and blue â an almost patriotic display of pageantry. And yet, there was no one to witness such a display, just as there was no one to displace to the side of the road. The sidewalks of Vetta Parkâs Light Industrial District were lined with abandoned lots and grassy patches sporadically littered with empty bottles.
Hobbs sped past warehouses and facilities â utility storage sheds and flat one-story edifices of dubious establishment. When she finally reached the quarry, it was a long, gravelly path to the bottom â one she winded and weaved while clutching the wheel, praying her tires could hold up.
At the bottom of the quarry, Roberta could see that an ambulance and fire truck had beat her to the scene. She saw five men in hard hats and overalls spread around the burned- out shell of a car. The stench lingered in the air and smoke plumes billowed from the sports carâs remains...but at least the fire was out.
One of the men caught sight of Roberta and wandered over. âHey, are you Vetta Park PD?â he asked. Roberta noticed that his cheeks were black, bits of ash dripping downâ ward from his mustache.
âYes,â she answered, and briefly swept the corner of her blazer, revealing a badge that was affixed to her belt. âWhat have we got here?â
The fireman tipped his head towards the car. âWell, Iâm sorry to say that there was a driver in there. A female. By the time we got here, there was nothing we could do. But she did say a few words to that guy.â
The fireman gestured towards a truck, and Roberta Hobbs got her first look at Dalton Beck. He was standing outside of his construction vehicle, nervously nibbling on his nails, his round head soaked in sweat.
Roberta thanked the fireman and walked over to the man. âHey there. Iâm Detective Roberta Hobbs with the Vetta Park Police Department.â She brandished her badge just as she had with the fireman: a quick sweep of the corner of her jacket, which revealed the silver, shield-shaped enamel. Then she reached into her back pocket and pulled out a small spiral- bound writing pad and a pen. âOkay if I ask you a few questions?â
The man nodded and dropped his hands to his side. âI didnât expect it to flare up like that,â he said. âI woulda tried to save her. I mean...I...I wanted to save her. I tried. She was stuck inside. I feel awful. Really awful.â
Roberta nodded and saw that he had tears in his eyes, a ruddy complexion, perhaps worsened by the sun. He was breathing quickly and his fingers were quaking â their nails bitten down to nubs.
âCan we start with your name?â she asked.
âOh...yeah...sorry...Dalton Beck. Most everyone calls me Beck. I work here loading dirt onto rock trucks usually. Usually have at least two other guys but they called out sick today. So itâs just me today.â
âOkay, Beck, can we move the conversation to over here?â Hobbs asked politely, but didnât wait for an answer. The sun was beating down, and she could feel sweat beads start to drip down her back. She walked Beck to a shady patch of land, dry rock sheltered by a protruding cliff overâ head. Perhaps it would be disarming for him to be further from the scene.
By then, more fire trucks had arrived â their conduit down the gravel path assisted by the firemen who had arrived first. It had become noisy by then â the barking orders of men mixed with the cry of an ambulance.
Roberta was at first surprised to see the ambulance depart with its lights and sirens triggered. From what she understood, there was, distressingly, no duty to perform, no reason for speed. But as the ambulance skidded its way north against the toil of fire trucks headed the opposite way, she saw the reason for it to announce its presence to vehicles that were twice its size â tires milling against rock while slipping across an unpaved trail.
To Hobbsâ credit, Beck did seem to calm down once they were a few more feet away. He crouched down and ran his fingers over his head, and when Hobbs asked a follow-up question â âCan you tell me what you saw?â â Beck appeared more lucid, more forthright in his response.
âI saw a sports car,â he said. âA really nice, expensive Ferrari go over that cliff over there.â Beck gestured towards the top of the cliff â the very spot where Hobbs had descended into the quarry, where fire trucks had been ambling down at a cautious pace, where the ambulance carrying the body of the carâs driver had finally summited.
So much for a clean crime scene, Hobbs thought to herself, with a whiff of annoyance. If the road had remained unsullied, she and her partner could track down a tire expert, who could look at the dirt and determine whether the sports carâs driver had tried to apply brakes before going over. But every emerâ gency vehicle carving its tire tracks into loose ground â rewriting the forensic evidence of this incident -- made that scenario less probable. Hobbs would still try, but she doubted the effort would lead anywhere.
Beck swallowed hard. âAnd I want to say...the driver gunned her engine,â he said, his voice wobbly. âI heard the engine goinâ â loud and clear â right before I saw the car jump.â
Hobbs nodded and made a few notes in her spiral noteâ book. They were quiet for a moment â Hobbs with her head bent down and Beck sniffling and rubbing his eyes â when Hobbs saw her partner, Ray Martinez, appear from the tawny haze.
Martinez was swatting dust off his pants while he made his way over, his eyes watery and his gait protracted. âWhatâs going on?â he addressed Hobbs. âI didnât even see you at first; itâs so dusty down here. Took me forever to get down that road.â Then, seeing Beck, he swiveled and offered his right hand. âHowâre you doing? Detective Ray Martinez.â
Beck shook the manâs hand, stated his name, and then retreated a few steps back. He found a spot of shade against serrated rock and bent his head. Hobbs had seen this type of behavior before and she knew he was dealing with the trauma of what heâd seen. There would be nightmares and coping mechanisms, flashbacks and wanton guilt. She wanted to suggest therapy to him, but first they had to get through the rest of the interview. Her softer side would have to wait.
âThis is a witness, Dalton Beck, and he was just telling me about what he saw,â Hobbs told Martinez. âHe was just saying that he heard the engine rev before the car went over.â
âI see,â Martinez said. âDid you see what type of car it was?â
âUm, I think it was a Ferrari,â Beck offered. âRed. Looked real nice, real expensive.â Then he shuddered as if reliving the moment of impact.
âHad you ever seen the Ferrari around here before?â Hobbs asked.
âNah, never,â Beck said. âIâd remember.â
âDid you get a chance to take a look at the driver?â
Beck nodded and looked solemnly over at Hobbs. She felt
like she had pressed at his most acute vulnerability, that his dark brown eyes â now roundedâ were going to pour forth a cascade of tears.
âI saw her,â Beck said, trying to subdue the quavering of his chin. âShe was...uh...she was sad. Looked like sheâd been crying. And...youâre gonna think Iâm crazy when I tell you this...but Iâm pretty sure it was Cecilia Cinvenue. You know, the movie star.â
Hobbs nodded and continued writing in her pad while Martinez pivoted and surveyed the rock behind him. She knew that Martinez was suppressing a smile â that he was maintaining his best stoic stance in the face of distress.
Hobbs put the odds of the driver being Cecilia Cinvenue at about one in a million, but Beckâs assertion didnât necesâ sarily surprise her either. Beck had been shocked out of his morning work by the sight of a horrific tragedy â and his brain was likely stimulated into delusions and mirages from what heâd seen.
This was why witness statements werenât as reliable as the state would like to believe. This was why she and Martinez were determined to maintain the appearance of normalcy, that there was nothing comical or unfeasible about placing Cecilia Cinvenue in a rock quarry in Eastern Missouri.
Had there ever been a celebrity sighting in Vetta Park? Once, Hobbs had heard rumors about a straight-to-video movie that was filmed in a series of abandoned lots near Vetta Parkâs seasonal farmersâ market. She had driven by and seen all the trappings of a movie set: trailers stationed at the side of the road, lighting setups and at least three different types of movie cameras. Still there were no actors and no scenes being shot, no fans asking for autographs and no subsequent write- ups of Hollywoodâs dalliance with this tiny Midwestern town. When Hobbs drove by again a week later, everything was gone â the lots as deserted as a stretch of untended farmland. She never did learn the name of the movie that was supposedly filmed (or at least partially filmed) in her hometown, and this was the closest Vetta Park had come to having a slice of fame â at least to Hobbsâ knowledge. So Beckâs claim that he had seen Cecilia Cinvenue behind the wheel was about as believâ able as if heâd said heâd seen an alien spaceship spring from the quarry.
But Beckâs claim wasnât a total loss. Most likely, the driver was someone who looked like Cecilia, and this would provide a fair bit of identifying information. Perhaps â like the actress â the driver had long blonde hair, bright blue eyes and pale skin. Perhaps she was small and dressed impeccably â prone to wearing form-fitting designer outfits and cutting-edge fashion.
Hobbs made a note on her pad to get Beck with the PDâs sketch artist. If the driver was so beautiful as to be mistaken for a movie star, it probably wouldnât take long to make an identification.
Also, there was the issue of the license plate. Hobbs hadnât seen a front plate, but she had glimpsed a license plate on the ground near the back of the burned-out carâs contorted husk. Once one of the uniformed officers ran the license plate, it probably wouldnât be too difficult to trace a line back to the driver.
Ray Martinez brought his gaze back to Beck and asked, âThis...uh...this famous actress who was behind the wheel. Did she say anything to you?â
Beck nodded. âYeah, she did. She said someone was chasing her.â
Hobbs kept the tip of her pen on the pad while she considered this. If Beck had heard correctly, it was a huge piece of evidence. âDid she say who?â
âNaw,â Beck said. âI couldnât ask her either...cause then the car blew up.â
âSo, she didnât get a chance to say anything else?â
âThatâs right, maâam.â
âSo, to be totally clear, she told you that someone had
chased her off the cliff?â
âWell...naw...not that someone was chasinâ her off the cliff.
Just that they was chasinâ her. Maybe they peeled off earlier in the chase and by then it was too late for her to stop.â
âAnd you didnât ask by whom?â
âYou serious? Look, Officer, I ainât had a chance to ask her anything after that. The car exploded, end of story.â
Hobbs could tell by Beckâs testy tone of voice that she had pressed him enough. But the identity of whoever was chasing this mystery driver â Cecilia Cinvenueâs doppelganger â could have been a juicy enough nugget to clear the case right then and there. Of course, Hobbs was going to push, and of course she was going to feel pangs of disappointment at Beckâs defiâ cient detective work.
By then a uniformed police officer was waving them over. She and Martinez left Beck by the cliffâs wall and walked towards the maelstrom of officers, first responders and charred metal.
âYouâre not going to believe this,â the officer said, motioning down at his notes.
Hobbs glanced downward and saw some letters and numbers scrawled in black ink on the manâs pad. He had written out California in looping script underneath the cryptic characters.
âIs it the plate?â Hobbs asked.
âYeah, the station just called it in. Youâll never guess who this car is registered to.â
Hobbs didnât have to guess. âCecilia Cinvenue,â she stated as though it were fact.
The officer looked dubiously at Hobbs. âYeah, thatâs right. Iâm thinking it might actually be the actress. You knew she was out here?â
âOur witness IDâd her,â Hobbs said, and then she turned towards Dalton Beck. He was crouched over, fumbling with a cigarette, sweat dripping from his glistening head.
So Beck had been right about Cecilia Cinvenue. It was, in fact, the starlet who gunned her engine loud enough to distract a man who was hauling rock. It was Cecilia who careened, full-tilt, off of an elevated platform, rather than face whatever was chasing her. Whomever.
Hobbs had a starting point but not much else. A well- known name â a beautiful face whose semblance had been tacked onto billboards, movie posters and magazine covers for at least three decades. The key to this case rested in her ability to answer one simple question: Who was chasing Cecilia Cinvenue?Â
Jillian Thomadsen's Movie Stars Shine Brighter in the Dark lends empathy to what it is to be a woman in the entertainment industry in this investigative thriller.
When famous movie-star Cecilia Cinvenue drives off of a cliff in Eastern Missouri, her last words launch an investigation for Detective Hobbs and her partner, Martinez.
Cecilia Cinvenue was being chased, or at least, that's the last thing she said to the only witness on the scene before she perished in the flames of the crash.
As the investigation launches, Hobbs becomes responsible for her teenage nephew, Nick, who is struggling in school and at home. It's the last thing she needs, but she takes it on anyway, to the detriment of her relationship.
Hobbs and Martinez interview those who would have the most motive to kill, and what they find surprises them both. As the case unfolds, so does Hobbs' understanding of Nick and his struggles.
Movie Stars is written in alternating timelines between the investigation of Cecilia's death and glimpses into Cecilia's life as she lived it, allowing for appropriate pacing as the detectives search for the key to unlock the mystery of Cecilia's possible murder while discovering all of the intricacies of her complicated relationship with herself, men, and the industry. With Cecilia being the main focus of the story, the depth to her character is rich, where the other character's are lacking. Hobbs, for example, is a main character whose history and emotions are largely unknown; a long-term relationship ends with the addition of her nephew to her household, and while it's a consideration to Hobbs, it doesn't come with any emotional in-depth emotional processing. Especially as they investigate a case of a woman who struggled so much with relationships.
Cecilia's history and storyline are intriguing as she goes from child stardom into movie-star fame, and as she faces the grief of aging out of an industry where the expiration date doesn't exist the same as it does for men. The storyline of the investigation is less interesting, with the leads lacking the thrill of discovery; more focus is put on Nick as Hobbs learns more about him.
The climax is also lackluster; the reveal of what happened to Cecilia is quick and improbable, both in the investigative and personal story lines.
Overall, Movie Stars examines hard truths about women in entertainment and living with learning disabilities but lacks depth and detail in its characters and plot.