- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: New English Library Ltd (July 20 2000)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 034072806X
- ISBN-13: 978-0340728062
- Product Dimensions: 17.2 x 10.8 x 2.4 cm
- Shipping Weight: 118 g
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
Penzler Pick, January 2000: When it comes to the novels of big-city cop life revolving around a single station house's daily dramas, Ed McBain wrote the book--50 of them, in fact. And whatever one thinks of the virtues of NYPD Blue, Hill Street Blues, or even Law and Order, there's the undeniable truth that McBain was there first, with his wonderfully reimagined New York. (Fans know that Isola is the stand-in for the borough of Manhattan, Riverhead for the Bronx, Majesta for Queens, Calm's Point for Brooklyn, and Bethtown for Staten Island.)
Here, as one hopes and expects, a body turns up within the opening pages. And also, as is often the case, Detective Steve Carella is there to spar with the medical examiner.
But there are other bodies and other police personnel in a story that takes the typical McBain route--no short cuts--that amounts to a crook's tour of the city he loves. With a cast of characters that ranges from socialites to hookers, The Last Dance takes in theater world chicanery, police brutality, and a pizza-joint massacre.
Ed McBain, also known as Evan Hunter, is the only American ever to have won the British Crimewriters Association's Diamond Dagger; he is a grand master of the Mystery Writers of America; his books have sold over a hundred million copies around the world; and he wrote the screenplay for Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, the Matthew Hope series of mystery novels with fairy tale and nursery rhyme titles (Rumpelstiltskin, Goldilocks, etc.), as well as the classic The Blackboard Jungle.
Celebrating the publication of the 50th novel in a series that stays amazingly fresh and incredibly readable is no small thing. This much-loved and seminal writer is a national treasure. If you're a mystery reader, you've undoubtedly read Ed McBain. If you haven't read one for a while, try this one. It's so good it will immediately send you scurrying back for the ones you missed. --Otto Penzler --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
The 50th novel of the 87th Precinct is one of the best, a melancholy, acerbic paean to lifeAand deathAin the fictional big city of Isola. The story begins with death: detectives Meyer Meyer and Steve Carella are questioning Cynthia Keating, whose father lies lifeless in a nearby bed. Cynthia claims she hasn't touched Andrew Hale since she discovered his body, but the cops suspect she's lying: for one thing, the corpse's feet are blue from postmortem lividity, a sign of death by hanging. The detectives' doubts turn darker when, after Cynthia admits she found her father hanged and, in shock, laid him down, the M.E. rules that Hale was murdered. Carella asks stoolie Danny Gimp to listen to the drums on the street for any hints of the killer. Danny calls back for a meet but is gunned down before Carella's eyes by two shooters, who escape. Much shoe leather hits the pavement before the cops find a possible motive: Hale left Cynthia the rights to a play now in preproduction as a major musical. If it's a hit, she and three other heirs stand to gain a fortuneAand Hale, the cops further learn, had refused to okay the production while alive. The dicks thus take their investigation into the bustling worlds of theater and high society, which McBain observes tartly. Further deaths ensue, further suspects arise, including a Jamaican hit man who sheds the blood of one of McBain's heroes. The closing of the case comes a tad easily to the cops and to the narrative, but overall this is McBain in classic form, displaying the writing wisdom gained over more than 40 years of 87th Precinct novels (the first appeared in 1956) to deliver a cop story that's as strong and soulful as the urban heart of America he celebrates so well. (Nov.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
"HE HAD heart trouble," the woman was telling Carella. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
"HE HAD heart trouble," the woman was telling Carella. Read the first page
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
A case of plagiarism.,
By
This review is from: The Last Dance (Mass Market Paperback)
The premise on which this crime novel is based is stated by one of the investigating officers. "When a stage musical is likely to make millions, there's always somebody who makes a claim of plagiarism." So Carella and his 87th Precinct fellow officers investigate several crimes here, and work their way through a large list of suspects whose motivation might be linked to the forthcoming production of a stage musical. You'll find the usual McBain mix here: vivid description, tight dialogue, frequent changes of location. You'll never find a dull sentence, or a lifeless piece of dialogue. It was published in the year 2000. If the drama sags slightly and the imaginative force is not as strong as the punch that hits you in some of the earlier McBain crime novels, bear in mind that this is the fiftieth time McBain has worked with this highly successful formula.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Everything falls into place nicely,
By
This review is from: The Last Dance (Mass Market Paperback)
THE LAST DANCE does a nice job of combining solid detective work with the occasional bit of chance to form a nicely constructed 87th precinct novel. All the players are here, including the man we love to hate Ollie Weeks, and the murder here is complicated by a series of events that are indirectly related, yet all lead to the eventual solution. A suicide that transforms into a homicide which ties into a play revival; only McBain can make something seemingly so far fetched work so well. For the 50th book in a series, this one definitely is spry for its age and McBain does his usual fine job making it all work.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Better and better,
By bill runyon (Indiana) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Last Dance (Mass Market Paperback)
This Ed McBain 87th Precinct book is proof that these storiesjust get better and better. The characters are complex and very, very human, and all the more believeable for it. An old man is found dead in mysterious circumstances, but there is no motive for his death, and the case stagnates until a very nice motive suddenly appears. The man was sitting on literary rights to a play about to be staged, and he was refusing to sell the rights. And a lot of people wanted that play to go and be staged; there was a lot of money at stake. Then one of Steve's favorite informers is shot to death in a pizza place, when the informer is talking to Steve and about to help him on a case. The audacity of that killing upsets the police, and the hunt begins in earnest. Plus, Fat Ollie gets involved and is determined to help the detectives of the 87th, whether they want it or not. There is a lot of action here, and the pace is fast and strong. A solid and good police-procedural entry.
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