June 1960. Thirteen people, a hotel on a small Greek island, a suddenly discovered corpse of one of the guests. While a storm rages outside, no one can leave the island and no one can arrive, including the police. However, by the will of fate, among those trapped on the island is Hopalong Basil — a movie star of Hollywood's golden age, who played Sherlock Holmes in fifteen films. And if you've played the famous London detective on the big screen for years and know all of Conan Doyle's stories about him by heart, it doesn't matter that you are no longer young, that your prime is probably over, that new stars have taken your place, and that hardened anti-heroes of film noir have taken the place of Sherlock Holmes. If a murder occurs, who else will investigate it but you? Arturo Pérez-Reverte — a former war journalist, a celebrated author of brilliant historical, military, adventure, and detective novels, translated into forty languages, the creator of the Captain Alatriste series, and a holder of the most prestigious literary awards. «The Last Case of Holmes» — his homage (let's hope not the last) to the genre of classic detective fiction, where investigation requires cool intellect, imagination, and talent for deduction, rather than flashy gunfire, brawls in dark alleys, flickering neon signs outside the window, and the inevitable bourbon in the desk drawer. Here, a battle of minds takes place. Here, there will be Holmes, Watson, Professor Moriarty — and possibly Irene Adler. And love for books will, of course, be present, because reading remains one of the few — perhaps the most important — weapons we have against evil, death, and chaos. For the first time in Russian!
-medium.webp)
