Anonymous Rex

Not many people know this, but dinosaurs only faked their extinction millions of years ago. Disguised in latex costumes, they've been working secretly among us ever since, at a ratio of 10-12% of the apparently human population. Some of them, like Vincent Rubio, hold down jobs as private eyes. And even though Vincent, while not extinct, has fallen on hard times - his partner Ernie Watson's been run down by a cab, his Lincoln's been repossessed, he's been drummed out of the Los Angeles Dinosaur Council - the canny Velociraptor still has what it takes to trace the links between an arson at the Raptor-owned Evolution Club, the murder last year of Camotaurus industrialist Raymond McBride, and Ernie's own death. Working with evidence supplied by Brontosaurus LAPD Sgt. Dan Patterson and tidbits dangled by McBride's scheming Camotaurus widow Judith and McBride's mistress, nightclub songbird Sarah Archer, Vincent follows the trail of Jaycee Holden, vanished Coleophysis ex-fiancee of comatose Evolution owner Donovan Burke, to Triceratops geneticist Dr. Emil Vallardo's nefarious plan to adulterate the dino gene pool. Along the way, Vincent not only provides detailed accounts of how to pass as a human, but unmasks such luminaries as Napoleon, Paul Simon, and Newt Gingrich as dinosaurs, which explains a lot about so-called human history. A whimsical, surprisingly logical farce aimed equally at fans of Who Censored Roger Rabbit? and devotees of interspecies sex. A sequel is in tile works. (Kirkus Reviews)