On This Page
Description
A biblical betrayal drives this trilogy from the World Fantasy Award–winning author, "a singular American fabulist" (William Gibson, author of Neuromancer).The price of immortality . . .
Two thousand years ago, there lived a man who sold some valuable information for a fee of thirty silver coins. His name was Judas Iscariot, and he is no longer with us. The coins, however, still exist—and still hold an elusive power over all who claim them . . .
Like Andrew Vanbergen, whose attempts show more at innkeeping bring in stranger business than he ever expected.
And Aunt Naomi, whose most prized family heirloom is a silver spoon—with a curiously ancient-looking engraving.
And especially old Mr. Pennyman, who is only five silver coins short of immortality . . .
"The Last Coin should confirm Blaylock's position as a trendsetter, breaking new ground rather than just exploring the old." —San Francisco Chronicle
"Against a lyric vision of the Southern California coast, cosmic conspiracy theories bump heads in a gleeful farce to produce another strange and wonderful book from the idiosyncratic author of Homunculus and Land of Dreams." —Publishers Weekly
"Weird and wonderful touches abound; Blaylock makes good use of his coastal setting, extracting his own brand of magic from familiar places and familiar things. While Biblical conspiracies and revisionist scriptures are all the rage now, Blaylock got the jump on the current crop by several years." —SFF Chronicles. Thriller. Fantasy. Fiction. show less
Tags
Recommendations
Member Reviews
Picking this book up, I thought it would be 70% supernatural thriller and 30% 1980s magical realism. In fact, the book is 30% supernatural thriller and 70% cozy mystery. Also, the main character is meant to be a lovable loser, but I just found him to be a loser, and much more annoying than lovable. There are also some pacing issues. One chapter begins with a quotation from Tristram Shandy, and appeared to be imitating it. While it's true the book was well-written in a clear and easy style, it definitely did not fit with me -- but I would certainly understand if other people liked it more than I did.
Not the same cover, not the same edition, but close enuf. Blaylock is in that minority of SF writers who're also clearly comical. I like that combination. Other writers that spring to mind are the team of G. C. Edmondson & C. M. Kotlan, Ron Goulart, & Rudy Rucker. I'd read more by him if I ever ran across anything again. There's something about absurdist SF that's dear to my parallel dimension baboon heart.
Eccentric Californian innkeeper Andrew Vanbergen is thrust into a magical quest to stop the villainous Jules Pennyman from collecting all thirty of Judas Iscariot’s silver coins, which grant immortality and dark power. While Pennyman has twenty-nine, the final coin is unknowingly in Andrew's possession.
I first read this book in the late 90’s and loved it. Ten years or so on, and I’ll admit to struggling with it this time round. This is more a reflection on me than the book - unless the fiction fairies have been subtly altering the plot whilst I wasn’t looking. Still enjoyable, just sometimes felt a little slow paced.
Would have been greatly improved with some serious editing. Too many scenes that were not funny enough to stand on their own for the sole purpose of showing the same characterization over and over and over again.
A charming, wacky novel. May not be for everyone, but if this is your cup of tea, you'll treasure it.
One of Blaylock's best. Possibly the best of his books.
Members
- Recently Added By
Lists
Books I Read Before The Invention Of The Internet.
144 works; 1 member
Author Information
67+ Works 6,030 Members
Some Editions
Awards and Honors
Awards
Series
Work Relationships
Is contained in
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- The Last Coin
- Original title
- The Last Coin
- Original publication date
- 1988-11
- People/Characters
- Andrew Vanbergen; Rose; Jules Pennyman; Beams Pickett; Aunt Naomi; Uncle Arthur
- Epigraph
- --Nay, if you come to that, Sir, have not the wises men in all ages, excepting Solomon himself, -- have they not had their Hobby-Horses: -- their running horses, their coins and their cockle-shells, their drums and their trum... (show all)pets, their fiddles, their pallets, their maggots and their butterflies? -- and so long as a man rides his Hobby-Horse peaceably and quietly along the King's highway, and neither compels you or me to get up behind him, -- pray, Sir, what have either you or I to do with it?
--Laurence Sterne Tristram Shandy - Dedication
- For Viki
And this time,
For my friend Lew Shiner,
Pen Pal and Surfing Buddy
And for the lovely Edie and her mint brownies, raccoon houses, and coffee ---
from the four of us - First words
- He sat in the back seat of a sherrut, a whirling dervish taxi, slamming down the road out of the Jerusalem Highlands toward the Ben-Gurion airport in Tel Aviv.
- Quotations
- "What's this? Trix? Aunt! Trix? You? You're after the prize! What is it?" He picked up the box and studied the back. "A glow-in-the-dark squid! Have you got it out of there yet?" He tilted the box, angling the littl... (show all)e colored balls of cereal so as to see the bottom, and nearly spilling them onto the table top. "Here it is!" He hauled out a little cream-colored, glitter-sprinkled squid, three-inches long and made out of rubbery plastic.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)Then, almost at once, as if the universe were playing along, the line jerked, then jerked again, and Andrew set the drag down just a bit, winked at Rose, and leaning back against the heavily bent pole, began to reel in the fish.
- Blurbers
- Gibson, William
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 527
- Popularity
- 56,364
- Reviews
- 10
- Rating
- (4.07)
- Languages
- English, French, German
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 9
- ASINs
- 5
