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At the least, LUCKY AT CARDS by Lawrence Block would be worthy of reading as a curiosity piece. It was originally published over 40 years ago under the title THE SEX SHUFFLE and the pseudonym "Sheldon Lord." While LUCKY AT CARDS contains some erotic scenes that might have been edgy for the time, the work does not qualify as pornography, by standards now or then. It is, however, an engrossing, fascinating work, arguably a superlative novel by an author who would come to write a bookshelf full of them.
Bill Maynard may be lucky at cards, but he makes his own good fortune more often than not. Maynard's luck, as it were, ran out during a late-night game in Chicago when his cleverness and cheating ways caught up with him. Maynard, laying low and licking his wounds in a small town somewhere between Illinois and New York, literally lucks into a friendly card game with a group of men whose occupations are professional --- a dentist, an accountant and a tax attorney, among others --- but whose card-playing abilities are strictly amateur. And, as smart as these men might otherwise be, they fail to recognize Maynard for what he is, which is a quiet, swift-moving shark among the minnows.
As it turns out, however, Joyce Rogers, the sensuous, world-wise wife of the tax attorney, knows Maynard for precisely what he is when she sees him: a cardsharp who is part of an exciting world that she traded in some years ago for wealth, security and maddening boredom. Maynard quickly becomes involved with her, and all that separates them from her husband's fortune is her husband. He concocts a scheme to eliminate the cuckolded spouse without murdering him, and things seem to go according to plan --- at least at first. When they begin going south, however, Maynard is left with one path to potential salvation, leaving the reader with two questions: Will Maynard recognize the path, and, if so, will he take it?
It is, to say the least, a surprise to encounter this long-lost work and be reminded once again of how good a craftsman Lawrence Block has been, and for how long. Maynard's scheme to eliminate Rogers's husband is remarkably well thought-out, even as one knows that it must be doomed to failure. Block keeps Maynard's jaded character and world-weariness honed to a fine edge, with the irony meter in the red at all times. LUCKY AT CARDS may be a hard-edged noir masterwork, but it is also as fine a morality tale as one could wish for, in a world where the best one can hope for is, perhaps, a draw.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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