Trama

Jessica protests when her book is turned into a tacky B-grade horror movie, and winds up as the prime suspect when producer Jerry Lydecker is murdered with a blunt instrument.

When Jessica hears on TV that director-producer Jerry Lydecker is turning her respectable mystery book "The Corpse Danced At Midnight" into cheap junk with sex and gore, she flies to Hollywood to protest. But studio boss Marty Strindberg, who sends her a junior lawyer, and Lydecker have a contract clause she signed waving her rights to object. When Jessica returns to apologize to Lydecker, she finds him killed on the set and becomes the only obvious suspect. Fortunately, LAPD Detective Mack Brody, an amateur writer himself, has enough faith in Jessica to encourage her snooping and believe she saw evidence which disappeared during the minute she talked to the security guard. Lydecker's ruthless behavior and romantic affair with the inexperienced female co-star provide several possible motives.—KGF Vissers

Jessica travels to Hollywood when she learns that producer Jerry Lydecker is making substantial changes to the film version of her book. Jessica isn't the only one who is upset with Lydecker, a hard-nosed businessman who has a knack for alienating everyone around him. He keeps his pretty star, Eve Crystal, under his thumb and has banned the writer of the screenplay, Allan Gebhart, from the lot. The director, Ross Hayley, and wardrobe designer, Marta Quintessa, hated the man. When Jessica finds Lydecker murdered on the movie set, the only real surprise is that the main suspect turns out to be Jessica Fletcher.—garykmcd