The Final Move

A brilliant serial killer is murdering people across the city, leaving behind a single clue at each scene: a chessboard with one new piece moved.

The victims have no connection. There is no motive. No forensic evidence. Only the boards.

When a retired chess grandmaster recognizes the positions as part of a carefully constructed original game, the investigation becomes a race against time. Each new murder adds another move. If the detectives can decode the pattern before the game ends, they may stop the final killing.

But the killer has been planning this for decades, and he has already anticipated every move the police will make.

Leading the case is Detective Francis Kiley, a seasoned homicide investigator who knows almost nothing about chess. Forced to partner with the eccentric grandmaster Jeff Petryk, Kiley soon realizes the murders are not the real game. They are only the opening.

The true final move has always been aimed at him.

Intelligent, suspenseful, and relentlessly paced, The Final Move is a chess-themed psychological thriller about strategy, patience, and the one choice a killer cannot predict.