Last Call

By Elon Green
Author: Elon Green
ISBN: 9781250224354
ON SALE: 03/09/2021

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ISBN: 9781250224354
ISBN: 9781250833020
ISBN: 9781250224347
Hardcover

The gripping true story, told here for the first time, of the Last Call Killer and the gay community of New York City that he preyed upon.

The Townhouse Bar, midtown, July 1992: The piano player seems to know every song ever written, the crowd belts out the lyrics to their favorites, and a man standing nearby is drinking a Scotch and water. The man strikes the piano player as forgettable.

He looks bland and inconspicuous. Not at all what you think a serial killer looks like. But that’s what he is, and tonight, he has his sights set on a gray haired man. He will not be his first victim.

Nor will he be his last.

The Last Call Killer preyed upon gay men in New York in the ‘80s and ‘90s and had all the hallmarks of the most notorious serial killers. Yet because of the sexuality of his victims, the skyhigh murder rates, and the AIDS epidemic, his murders have been almost entirely forgotten.

This gripping true-crime narrative tells the story of the Last Call Killer and the decades-long chase to find him. And at the same time, it paints a portrait of his victims and a vibrant community navigating threat and resilience.

Elon Green
ELON GREEN has written for The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, and The Columbia Journalism Review, and appears in Unspeakable Acts, Sarah Weinman's anthology of true crime. Last Call: A True Story of Love, Lust, and Murder in Queer New York was his first book and won the Edgar Award for Best Fact Crime.

Praise for Elon Green

"Last Call is both a riveting whodunnit and a broad cultural history of the times."

People

Last Call is not only a great book, nor a mere historical correction. It is an act of compassion...”

Boston Globe

"In true crime, the killers often become the focus, the object of fascination. This is not true in Last Call, which puts the victims first, and which, when it does reveal the discovery of the killer, doesn't attempt to make him seem like an anti-hero."

NPR

"So begins Elon Green’s terrific, harrowing, true-crime account of an elusive serial killer who preyed upon gay men in the 1990s, perfidiously turning the safe havens of gay bars into hunting grounds, and semi-anonymous late-night hookups into an opportunity to kill with impunity.”

The New York Times Book Review

"In these riveting pages, Green reclaims a time, a place, and a community, weaving together a decades-long forensic investigation with a poignant elegy to murdered men"

Esquire
Best Books of 2021 (So Far)

"This captivating and thought-provoking read is a humanity-filled twist on the true crime genre."

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