Saving Susy Sweetchild: Silver Screen Historical Mysteries 3. By Barbara Hambly. Edinburgh: Severn House, 2024

Saving Susy Sweetchild is the third of the Silver Screen Historical Mysteries. This series, set in Hollywood in the 1920s, started life as Bride Of The Rat God, a horror novel in which Norah Blackstone, an Englishwoman who had married an American soldier during World War I, lost her entire family, including her husband, and moved to Hollywood with her beautiful sister-in-law Christine, a silent movie star. They had to deal with a horrifying Manchu god which tears apart its victims, who wear a sacrificial necklace. It was a lot of fun. It’s probably out of print, though I was able to get it in audiobook.

Now, the fantasy elements have been removed and the novels are murder mysteries. Norah Blackstone becomes Emma Blackstone and Christine is Kitty. She still owns three cute Pekingese dogs, with the same names and personalities as in Bride Of The Rat God. Emma still has a cameraman as a boyfriend, though his name has been changed from Alec to Zal. Between the three of them, mysteries are solved.

In this one, there are some murders, but the main issue is the kidnapping of a child movie star, Susy Sweetchild. Her current film is unfinished, so the studio is not happy, not worrying about the child herself, but how they can finish the film without her if necessary. The child has been robbed of her earnings by her mother and other relatives want to get custody so they, too, can benefit from her work. In those days, children in film were not protected. The best known case was Jackie Coogan, who later went on to play Uncle Fester in The Addams Family. When he turned 21, he discovered that his mother and stepfather had squandered all the money he had earned as a child actor. The Coogan Act came in to protect other children. 

Emma, Kitty and Zal work together to solve the mystery and find Susy, hoping she is still alive.

It’s very readable stuff, with a lot of silent era Hollywood background. Like Christine, Kitty plays villain roles and enjoys them. Kitty is a lot less ditzy than Christine, though she does like men, plural, as Christine does. Despite that, she has enough of a brain to be involved in the mystery solving. 

I think I enjoyed this one even more than the second book, One Extra Corpse. It’s not surprising; Barbara Hambly’s books never seem to go downhill. There are twenty Benjamin January mystery books and they are still going strong. 

It doesn’t matter if you haven’t read Bride Of The Rat God, though you probably would enjoy this novel more if you have read the first two books in this series.

I bought my copy in Apple Books, and they are also in Kindle, but if you prefer print books, they should be available from your local bookshop.