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Leslie Gibson was a wealthy, beautiful, seventeen-year-old brat - out for kicks at any price! And Leslie had decided that Reid Rance, adventurer and travel guide extraordinaire, was just the man to show her the hot spots of Mexico. But touring led to trouble with a capital T, and Reid was soon minus one debutante, but plus several unwanted corpses, and desperately wanted by the Mexican and American police as well as the Mexican underground. Could Reid evade the cops and rescue Leslie from the underground abductors before time ran out for them both...?

Had girl, will travel...

Reid Rance was a travel agent. The kind who would take you where the tourists seldom went. But when Mrs. May Gibson asked him to chaperon her wild daughter Leslie around Mexico, he begged off. "Why me?" he asked.
"Because you were a police officer once," she answered, "and Leslie won't be able to shake you off."
Rance wanted no part of the deal, but he was behind in his rent, and Mrs. Gibson owned the building. In fact, Mrs. Gibson owned just about everything -- and everyone -- in Greengrove.
It wouldn't be easy, Rance warned Mrs. Gibson. And it wasn't. Within two days Leslie had disappeared from their Mexican hotel. And in her place was a note demanding $5,000 -- or else.

 
The Last Score - cover pocket book edition, Pocket Book N° 50486, 1964. (Book only mentions 1964, its copyright entry in the Catalogue at the Library of Congress states Oct 15. 1964)The Last Score - cover pocket book edition, Signet 451-Q6102, October 1974.The Last Score/Beware the Young Stranger - cover pocket book edition, Signet Double Mystery, 451 E8295, October 1978 (1st Double)The Last Score/Beware the Young Stranger - cover pocket book edition, Signet Double Mystery, 451 AE1307, Oct 1978
The Last Score - cover audiobook Blackstone Audio, Inc., read by Mark Peckham, March 1. 2015The Last Score - cover MysteriousPress.com/Open Road, September 22 2015
 
Tough tourist guide Reid Rance is hired to chaperon a wealthy teen-age sexpot on a journey through Mexico. When the girl is kidnapped and held for ransom, our macho protagonist doesn’t bother to notify the local authorities but launches a one-man war against the abductors.

Nevins states that the background is vividly evoked, the descriptions of a marijuana “high” ring true, and despite some implausibilities in the slender storyline this is a model of the men’s-magazine adventure novel.

Anthony Boucher (January 24, 1965) rightly called it “a straight-out adventure thriller,” “Good violent excitement,” he said, “tightly told.

Cast of characters included. Ghostwritten by Charles W. Runyon.

In a 2007 interview by Ed Gorman, Charles answered this to the question which of his novels he would most like to see reprinted and why?
 "There are at least three that might go down well with today's readers. 'The Last Score' was rushed to completion as a work-for-hire, for Manfred Lee and Fred Dannay, and published under their byline of Ellery Queen. I still have a paternal affection for the book, and would like to see it reprinted under it's 'rightful' parentage." 
 

De Afrekening - hardcover Dutch edition, Nederlandse Boekenclub, Den Haag- Antwerpen (Drawings by Betty van Linden van den Heuvel and Ch.Burki)Das Gold von Acapulco - cover German edition Ullstein Krimi Nr 1196, 19685000 δολλάρια για μια κούκλα - cover Greek edition, Viper, 19755.000 για μια κούκλα - Cover Greek edition, 2009, Δημοσιογραφικός Οργανισμός Λαμπράκη (Lambrakis)
Safari per una lolita - cover Italian edition, Il Giallo Mondadori Serie Nera Nr 980Ajuste Final - cover Portuguese edition, Livros de Bolso / Serie Clube do Crime, Publicações Europa-América, April 1990החטיפה במכסיקו - Cover Israelian edition, translated to Hebrew by M. Lapidot, published by M. Mizrahi, Tel Aviv, Israel, 1960's.

The Last Score Translations:  
Dutch/Flemish: De afrekening  
German: Das Gold von Acapulco  
Greek: 5.000 για μια κούκλα 
aka 5000 δολλάρια για μια κούκλα 

Hebrew:  החטיפה במכסיקו  
Italian: Safari per una lolita  
Portuguese: Ajuste Final  


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Other articles on this book

(1) Casual Debris (April 28. 2011)
 
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