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As high-profile Toronto cop Charlie Salter heads toward the mandatory retirement age of 60, four-time Arthur Ellis Award-winning author Eric Wright wraps up his most famous literary creation's career--10 police procedurals strong--in
The Last Hand. Frustrated by the glorified receptionist's job he's stuck in for his last months on the force, Salter leaps at the opportunity to reopen the stale murder case of Jerry Lucas, the lawyer brother of a prominent politician, whose last known visitor was a prostitute decked out in suggestive silver boots. The deeper he digs, the surer Salter becomes that there were fewer kinks in the victim's sex life than in his legal practice--and in the professional lives of his poker buddies.
Even though he's determined to prove that he's not yet washed up, the distractions of family and impending retirement slow down Salter's progress on the case. It doesn't help that his wife has taken off to be with her family in Prince Edward Island, where their eldest son has just produced a grandchild and is running a family business, or that their younger son is making plans to leave home. Salter's self-confidence is revived, however, when he's dealt a flush of inspiration during a card game, making it possible for him to solve his case while resolving his personal anxieties. --Deirdre Hanna
From Publishers Weekly
Toronto's Charlie Salter, head and sole member of the Special Affairs Unit, which deals with only the most sensitive police investigations, takes on his 11th and not terribly compelling case before turning in his badge, as proclaimed on the striking if somewhat cheesy jacket, which displays an ace of spades in a disembodied hand. Charlie has reached 60, the limit for Canadian police to retire from active service, but he's lost none of his smarts as he looks into the murder of a prominent lawyer found stabbed to death in his apartment, which a woman, who neighbors say dressed like a prostitute, was seen to leave. So far the search for the woman, or any other clues, has been fruitless. Charlie has been accused of being behind the times, not up on the latest innovations in police work, but he has his own methods, following routine q&a wherever it may lead him. Here the trail takes him to a poker game among Toronto's leading lawyers and, ultimately, to a state-of-the-black-arts stock swindler. Charlie is a congenial character, and the glimpses of his family life are the best parts of the story. Unfortunately, minimal suspense and a lack of concern for the victim, not to mention a dull villain, make this a standard, by-the-numbers mystery. Still, Wright (The Night the Gods Smiled, etc.) fans will fondly remember better books in the series and mourn Charlie's passing if this is indeed his last case. (Feb. 25)Pickett series.
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