The Last Detective

Please give my Amazon review a helpful vote - https://www.amazon.com/review/RAIA5O0GKV6Z1/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

Alien Invasion/Mystery Mash-up

Adrian Grace was working as a police detective in an unnamed city when the aliens arrived with their massive spaceships. Humanity fought back and lost big. Confined to their cities, which serve as ghettoes, and periodically drafted into labor battalions by human collaborators, things are not looking bright for mankind. In the midst of a radically changed world, Grace is called back to work to investigate the murder of an alien.

This story works as a mystery. The problem is set and clues are laid out for Grace to follow. Red-herrings are dragged across the trail, and the denouement has its surprises.

The story works less satisfactorily as a science fiction story, but, perhaps, I expect more from my science fiction. For example, I wanted to know more about the “slicks” and the “labor camps.” Obviously, the story is not really about either subject, but it was an itch I wanted scratched.

Likewise, there was a religious subtext in the book. Grace has a name with a religious connotation, but he is an atheist former Catholic, and the story features a religious sect known as the “abandoned,” who preach that God has abandoned humanity to its fate. The story references an alien's interest in St. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica. Ultimately, the religious subtext goes nowhere, although there is an interesting revelation that could have been used for greater effect.

I was impressed with this first book by author Brian Cohn on its own before I knew that Cohn has a full-time job as a doctor. The fact that he wrote a book of this quality with that background simply seasoned my appreciation of the book.