Last Dance

by Jeffrey Fleishman

Overview

A famous Russian ballerina lies dead in a downtown loft. No marks, no bruises. The suspects are many: spies, hit men, a gunrunner, and one of Hollywood’s most powerful and mysterious film producers. Detective Sam Carver becomes entangled in a perilous reignited Cold War between Moscow and Washington. He chases leads from Europe to Africa.

But Carver faces other demons, too. He is haunted by Dylan Cross, a killer who got away a year earlier. She knows his secrets, whispers to him in his dreams. His obsession with Dylan threatens his new case and his relationship with Lily Hernandez, a uniform cop who wants to work as his partner.

Last Dance explores dangers within and without, and how we reconcile the damage, love, and things lost, in a Los Angeles that is as tempting and alluring as it is cruel and sinister.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781982517328
Publisher:	Blackstone Publishing
Publication date:	11/10/2020
Series:	Sam Carver Series , #2
Pages:	310
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.60(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Jeffrey Fleishman is a Pulitzer Prize finalist and longtime foreign correspondent. He has had postings in Rome, Berlin, and Cairo and has covered wars in Iraq, Libya, and Kosovo. He is now Foreign and National editor for the Los Angeles Times. He is the author of the novels My Detective (the first Sam Carver book), Shadow Man, Promised Virgins: A Novel of Jihad, and most recently Last Dance.

Editorial Reviews

08/31/2020

Fleishman’s impressive sequel to 2019’s My Detective puts Det. Sam Carver of the LAPD on the case of Katrina Ivanovna, a famous Russian ballerina who was poised to reclaim her former glory on stage before being found dead of an apparent overdose in her apartment. Carver suspects foul play, but when the ballerina’s body is stolen from the morgue, the cause of death may never be determined. Was it an accidental overdose, or suicide, or did someone kill her? Carver gets on the trail of mysterious Russians who were threatening her and wanted her now missing diaries, in which she might have revealed family connections to KGB agents and Russian interference in the 2016 election. Fleishman nicely evokes Los Angeles, “a metropolis of spirits and distant lights, a cool, dark place of lies that spin along the coast and blow across the desert.” A hard-boiled, world-weary hero in the classic tradition of Philip Marlowe and Lew Archer, Carver will also appeal to fans of Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch. Fleishman is on his way to becoming a master of contemporary L.A. noir. Agent: Jill Marr, Sandra Dijkstra Literary. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

2020-07-29
Fleishman introduces a seen-it-all LA cop to a few things he’s never seen.

Whatever killed 42-year-old ballerina Katrina Ivanovna didn’t leave a mark on her. And since her body vanishes from the morgue before an autopsy, it’s anybody’s guess what killed her. Nor are the facts about her pre-decease much more definite. It’s clear that she considered her starring role in choreographer Andreas Stein’s new production of Giselleher last chance for a comeback, clear that she worried that her body was no longer equal to the demands of the role, and clear that she popped pills and accepted new sex partners with abandon. But what links might her Kremlin-connected mother have forged to Mickey (ne Mikhail) Orlov, the Hollywood producer whose shadowy past, perhaps including KGB membership, may have involved meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election? And why would anyone want to steal the body Katrina felt had betrayed her? The detective on the case, the LAPD’s Sam Carver, talks a great game, alternating between laconic dialogue and appealingly quotable reflections as he fights off his memories of Dylan Cross, the woman who escaped after taking him prisoner and confessing that she’d killed two men who’d raped her. But neither Carver nor his creator ever weaves together all the busy lines of the episodic plot, and by the end, he can only conclude: “The case isn’t solved, but the guilty are dead.”

The best review comes early, in the form of a presidential tweet: “LAPD can’t stop illegals, loses ballerina. SAD.

Kirkus Reviews

The gruff and gravelly voice of Richard Ferrone matches the hard-boiled and unflinching homicide detective Sam Carver perfectly. Fleishman’s second in what one hopes is a long series continues with a dead Russian ballerina and enough smog, blood, lust, and contemporary political intrigue to harken back to Chandler and Hammett. Ferrone’s performance of Carver growls with the ferocity of a lion on the prowl, adding an additional layer of menace and nuance. Fleishman’s detective Carver, who knows which rocks to turn over and where crooks and spies bury bodies, is aided by Ferrone’s bravura presentation. Picturesque Southern California plays a significant role as Ferrone produces its locale and colorful characters. R.O. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

DECEMBER 2020 - AudioFile