Rafferty's Last Case: A Minnesota Mystery featuring Sherlock Holmes

In the ninth and final Minnesota mystery, Sherlock Holmes and Shadwell Rafferty investigate Rafferty's murder, which may have been solved by his killer. Set in 1928 St. Paul, the story follows Rafferty's investigation and Holmes' search for the answer to both cases. The double mystery takes readers through St. Paul, with suspects such as an ambitious mayor, a blackmailer, a police detective, a poet-turned-mystery writer, and a priest. The woman in Minneapolis and the young man with incriminating documents provide Holmes with clues to a final confrontation with a devious murderer.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 384 pages
Publication date: 11 October 2023
Publisher: University of Minnesota Press

The ninth and final Minnesota mystery, in which Shadwell Rafferty, with the inimitable Sherlock Holmes, may have solved his own murder, begins with a murder. But in this case, the victim happens to be the detective, on the verge of revealing the culprit in an earlier crime. Had Shadwell Rafferty identified his own murderer? When news of Rafferty's death reaches Sherlock Holmes, in Chicago on the last leg of an American speaking tour, the world's most famous detective and his redoubtable companion Watson rush to Minnesota to hunt for their friend's killer.

Set amid the glittering society and sordid underworld of 1928 St. Paul, Larry Millet's ninth and final Shadwell Rafferty mystery takes readers through the serpentine twists of Rafferty's fatal investigation, even as Holmes, following in Rafferty's tracks, may be closing in on the answer to both cases. This ingenious double mystery takes us to every corner of St. Paul, from the city's most notorious speakeasy to a home for unwed mothers to the mansions of Summit Avenue, and at every turn, we find another suspect: an ambitious mayor and his devoted fixer-in-chief, a heartless blackmailer and a police detective mired in city hall connections, a poet-turned-mystery writer with a suspicious coterie, and a priest hiding a terrible secret.

A mysterious woman in Minneapolis who makes certain illicit arrangements and a young man in possession of incriminating documents provide Holmes with vital clues that lead to a final confrontation with an exceptionally devious murderer worthy of the exceptionally devious plot that brings the Minnesota mystery series to a fitting and powerful conclusion.

Dimension: 210 x 140 x 38 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781517913120