6 Irresistible Novels About Old Hollywood

A Touch of Stardust, by Kate Alcott
Three words for you: Carole. Lombard. Fanfic. It’s 1938, and Julie Crawford has come to Hollywood to write, just like her idol Frances Marion. Briefly fired by famed director David O. Selznik (Julie was tardy delivering a message to him on the set of Gone With the Wind, but to be fair, Atlanta was on fire at the time), Julie is rescued from unemployment by none other than the witty, bawdy, good-hearted Ms. Lombard. As Carole’s personal assistant, Julie must prevent the press from writing negative stories about her boss, which is somewhat difficult because Carole is having an affair with (married) Clark Gable, whose current picture is receiving acres of bad publicity. Julie and Carole share more than just their home state of Indiana; they’re both determined to pave their own paths as women. Delightful cameos arrive at a breakneck pace in this enchanting novel set behind the scenes of one of the greatest films of all time.

Die a Little, by Megan Abbott
Before she wrote her wickedly dark, teen-centered contemporary books Dare Me, The Fever, and this summer’s gymnastics tour de force You Will Know Me, Abbott wrote straight-up noir. Her 2005 debut, Die a Little, depicts twenty-something school teacher Lora and her beloved brother, Bill, a junior investigator, living together in 1950s Pasadena. (Is it a coincidence that Mildred Pierce occupied nearby Glendale, or that a seedy motel is known as The Locust Arms? I think not.) The siblings’ close-knit relationship is threatened by the arrival of Alice Steele, a film costumer who’s no stranger to the seedy underbelly of Hollywood. A frenzied, “unconventional beauty…like a windup toy, or dominoes falling, unstoppable,” Alice snags Bill for her husband. Lora senses trouble and dives deep to snuff it out, but Alice always seems one step ahead, “peeling masks off only to expose other, still brighter masks beneath.”

What You See in the Dark, by Manuel Muñoz
110 miles north of L.A., a dusty inland city currently known for its poor air quality and 108-degree summers, Bakersfield was a very different place in the 1950s, beautifully rendered by Muñoz in his unforgettable 2011 debut novel. An unassuming, lovely young Mexican American singer dates the most coveted white man in town, but their apparently dream-like romance ends in horror. As their star-crossed relationship plays out, Alfred Hitchcock arrives in town (complete with his film crew and leading lady, Janet Leigh), to film his seminal masterpiece, Psycho. Differing perspectives from out-of-towners and locals makes for a rich tapestry. “There is what you see and what you make of it, what you know for sure and what you have to experience, what others tell you and what gets confirmed.”

Silent Murders, by Mary Miley
In this sequel to Miley’s phenomenal debut The Impersonator, the title refers not only to the Silent Era film stars at risk, but also the method of their violent ends—the killer at large appears to be using a silencer. Enter smart, resourceful Jessie Carr, former Vaudeville actress who’s met enough hucksters, schemers, bootleggers, and scoundrels to recognize one when she sees one. (“Hollywood friends,” scoffs Jessie’s confidante and housemate, Myrna Loy. “The sort who come to your parties but not your funeral.”) As a script-girl-in-training on the 1925 set of Don Q, Son of Zorro, starring Douglas Fairbanks, Jessie becomes embroiled in a series of slayings tangentially related to Fairbanks and his generous, powerhouse wife, Betty Pickford. A delicious, unputdownable mystery, Silent Murders is based in part on the real-life killing of director William Desmond Taylor. (For the definitive non-fiction account of Taylor, don’t miss Tinseltown: Murder, Morphine, and Madness at the Dawn of Hollywood, by William J. Mann.)

West of Sunset, by Stewart O’Nan
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s last years on earth were spent in Hollywood as a staff writer at MGM, a position he found baffling at best. To Zelda, exiled at an asylum back east, he writes that he’s “ready to do battle with Goldwyn and Mayer and whatever third head of Cerberus guards the gates.” O’Nan’s effortlessly compelling imagining of Fitzgerald’s time in Los Angeles, in which he frets over his beloved daughter Scottie and romances Sheilah Graham, is so deft and real I think it may have launched a new literary style: third person memoir, perhaps? Walk-on roles from Dorothy Parker, Ernest Hemingway, and Humphrey Bogart add to the poignant, booze-and-pill-soaked atmosphere of 1930s Hollywood.

The Loved One, Evelyn Waugh
Sometimes it takes an outsider’s perspective to see something for what it really is. Prolific English writer Waugh went for the satiric jugular in this account of Brits living in 1940s Los Angeles and working in the entertainment industry. Let go from his job at Megalopolitan Pictures, young poet Dennis Barlow scandalously leaves the film business for a job at Happier Hunting Grounds, a pet cemetery. Things only get stranger from there, when he falls for a cosmetician at a (human) mortuary. A bone-dry, hilarious look at the absurdity of Hollywood and those who become trapped trying to maintain careers as writers or publicists in an ever-fickle industry.
What are your favorite novels about Old Hollywood?