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Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780060840907
ISBN number: 0060840900
Label: William Morrow
Manufacturer: William Morrow
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 304
Printing Date: July 01, 2008
Publishing house: William Morrow
Release Date: June 24, 2008
Sale Popularity Level: 9333
Studio: William Morrow
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Product Description:
Keller's a hit man. For years now he's had places to go and people to kill.
But enough is enough. He's got money in the bank and just one last job standing between him and retirement. So he carries it out with his usual professionalism, and he heads home, and guess what?
One more job. Paid in advance, so what's he going to do? Give the money back? In Des Moines, Keller stalks his designated target and waits for the client to give him the go-ahead. And one fine morning he's picking out stamps for his collection (Sweden 1-5, the official reprints) at a shop in Urbandale when somebody guns down the charismatic governor of Ohio.
Back at his motel, Keller's watching TV when they show the killer's face. And there's something all too familiar about that face. . . .
Keller calls his associate Dot in White Plains, but there is no answer. He's stranded halfway across the country, every cop in America's just seen his picture, his ID and credit cards are no longer good, and he just spent almost all of his cash on the stamps.
Now what?
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers 
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Broke, destitute, without a friend in the world, every member of law enforcement in the continent is looking for you, your face on every media format available. Can it get worse? Actually, he might say that it wasn't bad at all. Without going into detail, life dramatically changes for the man who rode a thousand miles to kill a man he never met, and he still collects a few stamps along the way. I enjoyed every book the LB has written; this one is not a disappointment. It slows down a wee bit in the middle as the angels are singing, the birds are chirping and life is becoming a strange wonderful dream for Keller. I like the way LB weaves the book together. We are lulled into a feeling of nirvana and in a second, the man of action is back in the saddle and the gears are shifted again. While Mr. Keller is still the deep thinker, still trying to figure the half-full/half-empty what life is all about puzzle he is still the man who reacts instantly with conviction. Some of his reactions are amazing in this book. He is becoming human, with feelings and desires beyond a complete collection. But if it is the series finale, it's a good way to go out, and he does it with style.
Rated by buyers 
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I've read most of Lawrence Block's work and I enjoy his books a great deal, but this time I finished and just felt "empty" as John Keller once again is on an assignment only to find out that he becomes the number one suspect in an assassination. He was framed and he realizes he must run, but the book just didn't go anywhere. I tired of the adventure back to New York and just did not have any interest in the direction of the plot.
Yes, Dot is back (and as funny as ever) and Keller has his moments, but I was disappointed in the book. Will Keller be back? Who knows. Block leaves the ending sort of open though I'm not sure that Block is trying to retire Keller for good.
Anyway, it's an "okay" read. Lawrence Block has better books and I just can't recommend this one as one of the better reads in his extensive writings.
Rated by buyers 
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Keller is a stamp collecting contract killer, whose life is turned upside down when he accepts a last "hit" after he had decided to retire. The assassination was to take place in Des Moines, except it keeps being postponed day after day. Then, as Keller is buying some stamps from a local dealer, the announcement comes over the radio that the Governor has been shot dead. Then a picture of Keller appears in the media, and he is branded as the shooter even though he wasn't. The Governor wasn't even Keller's intended target.
The plot, simple enough, moves forward as Keller attempts to stay one step ahead of law enforcement--and apparently the person who hired him for the Des Moines job. It's no easy task--having used up almost all his cash to buy the stamps, Keller is unable to fly or take a train or bus out of Iowa, and his rented car has been identified by the police.
Keller is a likable series character, in which this is the fourth entry, and let's hope he will be found in future ones as well. The book is amusing, inventive and fun to read. He's careful and smart, but this time it takes a lot of ingenuity for him to stay alive. He can't go home to his New York City co-op, apparently his stamp collection is lost, and his friend and associate Dot is seemingly shot and her house burned down. All he can do is run. It's a helluva story and a great read, and is highly recommended.
Rated by buyers -
This is definitely one of Block's better efforts and the best in a while.
Keller, the professional hitman, is set up. The set up makes him wanted for the assassination of a presidential candidate. So he hits the road. He runs and runs and runs some more. Most of the book accounts for how he runs and remains undetected. It is sort of a mystery in reverse, but is a great rendition of surviving one step in front of the law. The book moves and moves.
Keller is a real person. He has a great relationship with Dot, his "agent" and developes a few other relationships in this book. He is a criminal you can like and root for, which is an intriguing anomaly of the character. How can you like a guy who kills for a living so darn much?
As always with Block there is plenty of witty repartee and smart entertaining dialogue. Since the book is a very first person narrative, Keller's internal wit is always on display.
This is a good, fast-paced, entertaining mystery that is difficult to put down once started. Highly recommended.
Rated by buyers -
Readers of the Keller series typically ask themselves what it is about the stamp collecting hit man that makes him so appealing; we want him to win. On the surface I suppose we are attracted by the adventure. Imagine you have suddenly lost everything: assets, home, family and friends, and had to go on the run. Then imagine that on top of that, you are the most wanted person in America and the stakes are not freedom or incarceration but life and death. The tactics Keller uses are as good as those used by the assassin in "Day of the Jackal." The reader will certainly wonder how they themselves would have responded in similar circumstances.
There is however, a far deeper aspect to this book, which is certainly one of Block's best. You see, the hero collects stamps. As Ayn Rand once wrote, "The pleasure of that hobby lies in a certain special way of using one's mind. Stamp collecting is a hobby for busy, purposeful, ambitious people - because, in patterns, it has the essential elements of a career, but transposed to a clearly delimited, intensely private world..." It also, I point out, seeks both beauty and knowledge. Life is what we spend our time thinking about and Keller's loss of his collection and hobby as he goes on the run forces the reader to ponder what it is that makes life beautiful for them. There is no question Keller is warped, and I have heard readers state that, "Well, nobody is perfect" as they try to excuse him. The brilliance of this work is that what Keller does is beside the point. What the reader really is drawn to is their own unwritten reaction to the larger personal issues represented by Keller's actions and hobby and the resulting private conversation about right and wrong.
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