Valentino wants to keep The Oracle, his beloved run-down movie palace, from being condemned before it even reopens, but murder keeps intruding into his otherwise quiet life. At a gala party held in memory of screen legend Greta Garbo, he's having fun until the host, a hotshot developer named Matthew Rankin, tells Valentino about a certain letter from Garbo to his late wife. She and Garbo had been...close. Such a letter is of great interest to a film...

"Film detective Valentino is summoned to the estate of Ignacio Bozel to collect a prized donation to the university's movie library: Bleak Street, a film from the classic noir period, thought lost for more than sixty years. Bleak Street was never released. Its star, Van Oliver, a gifted and charismatic actor with alleged ties to the mob, disappeared while the project was in post-production, presumably murdered by gangland rivals: another one of Hollywood's...