DON'T EXPLAIN

Jellyroll, the celebrity dog whose earnings Artie Deemer lives off, has been threatened by a pair of wacko stalkers. So Artie accepts the invitation of his actor friend Clayton Kempshall to spirit Jellyroll off to Kempshall Island, Maine—and finds more crazies there, and more trouble, than he ever left behind. Both Hawley Self and his father Arno are eager to confess to murdering Coompton Kempshall, the father who almost killed Clayton when he burned down their house; a serial killer seems intent on keeping the island's homicide count current; Commander Sparky Hickle's maiden voyage in his homemade submarine turns out to be his last; and the stalkers catch up to Jellyroll at the height of the obligatory nor'easter. Artie's third outing (Lush Life, 1992, etc.) is jammed fuller of malice than a holding pen—with, sadly, about as little rhyme or reason. Murphy seems to have taken his own title's advice a little too seriously.