The Last Sellout

5 OUT OF 5 STARS! "Fans of the hardboiled good old stuff should rejoice. Jack Bludis is a true Keeper of the Flame, and The Last Sellout is a more than worthy addition to the PI canon. Five out of five stars!" -Richard Helms, two-time Derringer Award winning author of Thunder Moon. 


Anthony and Shamus award finalist, Jack Bludis returns with another memorable PI thriller! It's the early 1950s, and former movie audiences were staying home to watch I Love Lucy on TV. Television's big success meant declining attendance and revenues at the movies. Studio executives were taking every means to compete, including subterfuge, double-dealing, theft, and the sin-of-sins, merging with New York, TV production companies. In this compelling mystery, a young studio secretary is missing along with a number of valuable scripts that might be adapted for television. Their author is murdered, and within a few days, he is nominated for an Oscar. At the same time, a New York TV genius is playing studio against studio for production space and artistic control. Hired to investigate the writer's murder, a cynical private eye finds himself involved with a violent motorcycle gang, low-lifes, and studio bigwigs. Then an apparent innocent is murdered, another remains missing, and the detective becomes an avenging angel. His actions endanger not only his own life, but the life of  the woman he loves. This mystery as Roman a clef features invented lead characters intermingled with real studios, executives, and actors. Long-time movie fans will recognize the real-life counterparts behind their fictional disguises. 


"Jack Bludis is the keeper of the flame: an author who puts the hard in hard-boiled, but the heart too. The Last Sellout proves yet again that there is a link to the giants of the genre and his name is Bludis." -Reed Farrel Coleman, Three time Shamus Award winning author of Innocent Monster.