Bitter Lemon Press

The fourth novel from Claudia Piñeiro, South America's best-selling crime novelist.

When a renowned Buenos Aires industrialist is found dead at his home in an exclusive gated community called La Maravillosa, the novelist Nurit Iscar (once nicknamed Betty Boo owing to a resemblance to the cartoon character Betty Boop) is contracted by a former lover, the editor of a national newspaper, to cover the story. Nurit teams up with the paper's veteran, but now demoted, crime reporter. Soon they realize that they are falling in love, which complicates matters deliciously.

The murder is no random crime but one in a series that goes to the heart of the establishment. Five members of the Argentine industrial and political elite, who all went to the same boarding-school, have died in apparently innocent circumstances. The Maravillosa murder is just the last in the series and those in power in Argentina are not about to allow all this brought to light. Too much is at stake.

"Pastor's plot is well crafted, her prose sharp. . . . A disturbing mix of detection and reflection."—Publishers Weekly

"A mystery, it rivets the reader until the end and beyond, with its twist of historical realities. A historical piece, it faithfully reproduces the grim canvas of war. A character study, it captures the thoughts and actions of real people, not stereotypes."—TheFree Lance-Star

Part wartime political intrigue, detective story, psychological thriller, and religious mystery, Ben Pastor's debut follows a German army captain and a Chicago priest as they investigate the death of a nun in Nazi-occupied Poland.

In October 1939 Captain Martin Bora discovers the abbess, Mother Kazimierza, shot dead in her convent garden. Her alleged power to see the future has brought her a devoted following; her work and motto, "Lumen Christi Adiuva Nos" ("Light of Christ, help us"), appear also to have brought some enemies.

Father Malecki has come to Cracow, at the pope's bidding, to investigate Mother Kazimierza's powers. The Vatican orders him to stay and assist Bora in the inquiry into her killing. Stunned by the violence of the occupation and the ideology of his colleagues, Bora's sense of Prussian duty is tested to the breaking point. The interference of seductive actress Ewa Kowalska does not help matters.

Ben Pastor, born in Italy, has lived for thirty years in the United States, working as a university professor in Vermont. She is the author of other novels, including The Water Thief and The Fire Walker (St. Martin's Press).

Praise for Iain Levison:

“The real deal . . . bracing, hilarious and dead on.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Witty, deft, well-conceived writing that combines sharp satire with real suspense.”—Kirkus Reviews

“Levison writes tight, punchy prose, with deadpan humor and savvy.”—The Wall Street Journal

Philip Dixon is down on his luck. An escape from a lucrative but botched bank robbery lands him bleeding and on the verge of collapse in a college town in New Hampshire. How can he find a place to hide out in this innocent setting? Peering into the window of the nearest house, he sees a glimmer of hope: a man in his mid-thirties, obviously some kind of academic, is rolling around on the living room floor with an attractive high-school student. Professor Elias White is then blackmailed into harboring a dangerous fugitive, as Dixon—with a cool quarter-million in his bag and dreams of Canada in his head—gets ready for the last phase of his escape.

But the last phase is always the hardest. Attractive and persistent FBI agent Denise Lupo is on his trail. As for Elias White, his surprising transition from respected academic to willing accomplice poses a ruthless threat that Dixon would be foolish to underestimate.

"...Funny and acerbic, and crackles with raw energy."—The Sunday Times (UK) 

"Nair writes big, brave descriptions of one brutal murder after the next, relentlessly describing each death even as sub-inspector Santosh loses his breakfast over them."—Time Out

It's the first day of Ramadan in heat-soaked Bangalore. A young man begins to dress: makeup, a sari, and expensive pearl earrings. Before the mirror he is transformed into Bhuvana. She is a hijra, a transgender seeking love in the bazaars of the city.

What Bhuvana wants, she nearly gets: a passing man is attracted to this elusive young woman—but someone points out that Bhuvana is no woman. For that, the interloper's throat is cut. A case for Inspector Borei Gowda, going to seed, and at odds with those around him including his wife, his colleagues, even the informers he must deal with. More corpses and Urmila, Gowda's ex-flame, are added to this spicy concoction of a mystery novel.

Most intriguing is the grim world of Bhuvana. Her hijra fantasies, emotions, and hopes are etched in a way that is chilling yet oddly touching. Some mysteries remain till almost the end, for instance Bhuvana's connection with the wealthy, corrupt Corporator Ravikumar, who lives in a mansion as grand as the Mysore Palace and controls whole districts of Bangalore.

Anita Nair lives in Bangalore and is a prize-winning author. Her novel Ladies Coupe, published in the United States by St. Martin's Press, is a feminist classic which has been translated in thirty languages all over the world. This is her first crime novel.

“Prose that penetrates the reader’s mind like speed, fast paced, without an ounce of fat.”—Weltwoche

He’s found five pounds of top--quality Peruvian cocaine in a suit-case. Pur-sued by the police and drug traffickers the luckless Blum falls prey to the frenzied paranoia of the cocaine addict and dealer. This is a fast-paced thriller written with acerbic humour, a hardboiled evocation of drug-fuelled existence and a penetrating observation of those at the edge of German society.

Having broken his addiction to on heroin at the age of thirty, Jörg Fauser spent much of the rest of his life dependent on alcohol. He died aged forty-three in 1987, run over by a truck at four am on a German highway.

“It’s a fine example of the craft of detective writing in a period which some regard as the golden age of crime fiction.”—The Sunday Telegraph

The death of a traveling salesman appears to be an open and shut case. Studer is confronted with an obvious suspect and a confession to the murder. But nothing is what it seems. Envy, hatred, and the corrosive power of money lie just beneath the surface. Studer’s investigation soon splinters the glassy façade of Switzerland’s tidy villages and manicured forests.

Diagnosed a schizophrenic, addicted to morphine and opium, Friedrich Glauser spent the greater part of his life in psychiatric wards, insane asylums and prison. His acute observations conjure up a world of those at the margins of society.

"Carofiglio writes crisp, ironical novels that are as much love stories and philosophical treatises as they are legal thrillers."—The New Yorker

"Part legal thriller, part insight into a man fighting his own demons. Every character in Carofiglio's fiction has a story to tell and they are always worth hearing. As the author himself is an anti-mafia prosecutor, this powerfully affecting novel benefits from veracity as well as tight writing."—Daily Mail

"A novel as much about human nature and the passage of time as it is about law-breaking. Crisp laconic sentences, subtle shifts in tone, and a seamless translation that should be commended."—The Times Literary Supplement

When Martina accuses her ex-boyfriend, the son of a powerful local judge, of assault and battery, no witnesses can be persuaded to testify on her behalf, and one lawyer after another refuses to represent her. Guido Guerrieri knows the case could bring his legal career to a premature, messy end, but he cannot resist the appeal of an apparently hopeless cause. Nor can he deny an attraction to Sister Claudia, the young woman in charge of the shelter where Martina is living. Claudia shares his love of martial arts and his virulent hatred of injustice.

Gianrico Carofiglio was an anti-Mafia prosecutor in Bari, a port on the coast of Puglia, for many years, and is now a member of the Italian senate. He has sold over 2.5 million books of the Guerrieri series in Italy alone.

“Di Fulvio exposes souls with the skills of a surgeon. It’s like turning the pages of something forbidden—seductive, elegant and dangerous.”—Alan Rickman

“A wonderful first novel that will seduce the fans of deranged murderers in the style of Hannibal Lecter. And beautifully written to boot.”—RTL

“A novel that caresses and kisses in order to violate the reader with greater ease.”—Rolling Stone

“A powerful psycho-thriller of spine-shivering intensity. Written with immense intelligence and passionate menace. Not to be read alone at night.”—The Times

“Know why she’s smiling?” he asked, pointing a small torch at the corpse. “Fish hooks. Two fish hooks at the corners of her mouth, a bit of nylon, pull it round the back of the head and tie a knot. Pretty straightforward, right?” Amaldi noticed the metallic glint at the corners of the taut mouth.

Inspector Amaldi has enough problems: a city choked by a pestilent rubbish strike, a beautiful student harassed by a telephone stalker, a colleague dying of cancer, and the mysterious disappearance of arson files concerning the city’s orphanage. Then the mutilated bodies begin to appear.

This novel of violence and decay, with its vividly portrayed characters, takes place over a few oppressive weeks in an unnamed Italian city that strongly evokes Genoa. A finalist for the European Crime Writing Prize.

“After reading Friedrich Glauser's dark tour de force In Matto's Realm, it's easy to see why the German equivalent of the Edgar Allan Poe Award is dubbed ‘The Glauser.’”—The Washington Post

Praise for the Sergeant Studer series:

“Thumbprint is a fine example of the craft of detective writing in a period which fans will regard as the golden age of crime fiction.”—The Sunday Telegraph

“In Matto’s Realm is a gem that contains echoes of Dürrenmatt, Fritz Lang’s film M and Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain. Both a compelling mystery and an illuminating, finely wrought mainstream novel.”—Publishers Weekly

When, in later years, Sergeant Studer told the story of the Chinaman, he called it the story of three places, as the case unfolded in a Swiss country inn, in a poorhouse, and in a horticultural college. Three places and two murders. Anna Hungerlott, supposedly dead from gastric influenza, left behind handkerchiefs with traces of arsenic. One foggy November morning the enigmatic James Farny, nicknamed the Chinaman by Studer, was found lying on Anna’s grave. Murdered, a single pistol shot to the heart that did not pierce his clothing. This is the fourth in the Sergeant Studer series.

Friedrich Glauser is a legendary figure in European crime writing. He was a morphine and opium addict much of his life and began writing crime novels while an inmate of the Swiss asylum for the insane at Waldau.

“A magnificent novel. Haunted by the tragic story and passion of its characters.”—Magazine Littéraire

The first of the Havana quartet featuring Inspector Mario Conde, a tropical Marlowe. A young transvestite in a beautiful red dress is found strangled in a Havana park. Conde’s investigation into a violent murder exposes a stifling, corrupt society, a Cuban reality where nothing is what it seems. A dark and fascinating world of men and women born in the revolution who live without dreaming of exile and seek their identity in the midst of disaster.

Leonardo Padura lives in Cuba. He is a novelist, essayist, journalist and scriptwriter. Havana Red has won numerous literary prizes, including the Hammett prize in Spain.

Praise for Harri Nykänen's Nights of Awe:

"The clever combination of classic Jewish themes with the traditions of Nordic crime makes for a refreshing tale with wide appeal. And the subtle humor makes it even better."—Booklist

"Professional responsibility and ethnic affiliation clash in Nykänen's intriguing first novel. The resolution will satisfy noir fans."—Publishers Weekly

"Ariel Kafka wins the award for most intriguing name for a fictional detective, and it suits this impressively labyrinthine mystery series."—Time Out

The second in the Ariel Kafka series.

There are two Jewish cops in all of Helsinki. One of them, Ariel Kafka, a lieutenant in the Violent Crime Unit, identifies himself as a policeman first, then a Finn, and lastly a Jew. Kafka is a religiously non-observant forty-something bachelor who is such a stubborn, dedicated policeman that he's willing to risk his career to get an answer. Murky circumstances surround his investigation of a Jewish businessman's murder. Neo-Nazi violence, intergenerational intrigue, shady loans—predictable lines of investigation lead to unpredictable culprits. But a second killing strikes closer to home, and the Finnish Security Police come knocking. The tentacles of Israeli politics and Mossad reach surprisingly far, once again wrapping Kafka in their sticky embrace.

Harri Nykänen, born in Helsinki in 1953, was a well-known crime journalist and is now dedicated to writing fiction. The first in the Ariel Kafka series was Nights of Awe. Nykänen's work exposes the local underworld through the eyes of the criminal, the terrorist, and now from the point of view of an eccentric Helsinki police inspector.

"Plot twists galore, relentless suspense and expert insights to satisfy anyone fascinated by today's financial crisis."—Culture TF1

From Lagos to London, by way of the Faroe Islands and St. Petersburg, an investigation turns deadly. The head of the Nigerian fraud squad is evacuated from Lagos by secret service operatives. Meanwhile a junior prosecutor in Nice probes the mysterious death of the wife of a powerful banker and a crusading journalist in St. Petersburg pursues a corrupt oligarch and his criminal business empire.

The paths of all three cross in London, where they find themselves embroiled in violent events obviously linked to financial and political interests and hunted by the oligarch's men, the Western secret services, and goons sent by Nigerian oil magnates.

A satirical, intelligent, and fast-paced thriller set in the world of high finance and low politics, The Eyes of Lira Kazan is co-written by Eva Joly and Judith Perrignon.

Eva Joly is a prominent former prosecuting judge in Paris, France, and a candidate in the 2012 French presidential election. She is Norwegian born and this is her first novel.

Judith Perrignon is a prize-winning essayist and the author of a number of historical and other literary works, including La nuit du Fouquet's avec Ariane Chemin. This is her second novel after the much lauded Les Chagrins, published in France in 2011.

While on a business trip to Kobe, Tsuneo Asai receives the news that his wife Eiko has died of a heart attack. Eiko had a heart condition so the news of her death wasn’t totally unexpected. But the circumstances of her demise left Tsuneo, a softly-spoken government bureaucrat, perplexed. How did it come about that his wife—who was shy and withdrawn, and only left their house twice a week to go to haiku meetings—ended up dead in a small shop in a shady Tokyo neighborhood?

When Tsuneo goes to apologize to the boutique owner for the trouble caused by his wife’s death he discovers the villa Tachibana near by, a house known to be a meeting place for secret lovers. As he digs deeper into his wife's recent past, he must eventually conclude that she led a double life...

Seicho Matsumoto was Japan's most successful thriller writer. His first detective novel, Points and Lines, sold over a million copies in Japan. Vessel of Sand, published in English as Inspector Imanishi Investigates in 1989, sold over four million copies and became a movie box-office hit.

“Are you a Nicci French fan? Then read The Dinner Club.”—Beau Monde

“A thrilling read.”—De Telegraaf

“An exciting novel that is also a morality tale laced with biting satire.”—Het Parool

When Evert dies in his burning villa, everything points to suicide. The other members of the “dinner club,” a group of five women who meet regularly and whose husbands do business together, rally around to support Babette, his grieving widow. But events soon spiral out of control. Within weeks, a member of the club falls from the balcony of a hotel and dies. Something is poisoning their smug world of flashy SUVs, coffee mornings, and wine-filled evenings and bringing death in its wake.

This is a high-spirited, sexy, and ingeniously plotted tale about people desperate to hang on to the trappings of success—at any cost.

Imagine Desperate Housewives scripted by Patricia Highsmith. That’s The Dinner Club.

Saskia Noort is a freelance journalist and writes features for, among others, the Dutch editions of Marie Claire and Playboy. Her first thriller, Back to the Coast, was published to great acclaim in 2003. The Dinner Club followed in 2004 and, with over 300,000 copies sold, has topped the Dutch bestseller list.

The pair leaves London for occupied Venice, where Ann tries to cope with the monstrous ego of her lover. Forced to flee with a stranger, she delves into her past, to be jolted by a series of revelations--about her lover, her parentage, the stranger, and herself.

Janet Todd is known for her works about Mary Wollstonecraft, Aphra Behn, the Shelley circle, and Jane Austen. Born in Wales, her wandering childhood in the United Kingdom, Bermuda, and Sri Lanka led to work as an academic in Ghana, the United States, and United Kingdom. Her passion has been for women writers, the largely unknown and the famous. A former president of Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge, she lives in Cambridge and Venice.

Praise for Claudia Piñeiro's Thursday Night Widows:

"An agile novel, a ruthless dissection of a fast decaying society.”—José Saramago, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

“A gripping story. The dystopia portrayed is an indictment not solely of an assassin but of Argentina’s class structure and the willful blindness of its petty bourgeoisie.”—The Times Literary Supplement

“A fine morality tale which explores the dark places societies enter when they place material comfort before social justice, and security before morality.”—Publishers Weekly

Ines is convinced that every wife is bound to be betrayed one day, so she is not surprised to find a note in her husband Ernesto’s briefcase with a heart smeared in lipstick crossed by the words “All Yours” and signed, “Your true love.”

She follows him to a park on a rainy winter evening and witnesses a violent quarrel he has with another woman. The woman collapses; Ernesto sinks her body in a nearby lake. When Ernesto becomes a suspect in the case she provides him with an alibi. After all, hatred can bring people together as urgently as love. But Ernesto cannot bring his sexual adventures to an end, so Ines concocts a plan for revenge from which there is no return.

Claudia Piñeiro, formerly a journalist and playwright, is the author of literary crime novels that are all bestsellers in Latin America and have been translated into six languages. All Yours follows on the success of Thursday Night Widows, published in 2010 in the United States.

"Kettenbach provides answers that are either darkly humorous or melancholically tragic, depending on how black the reader's heart proves to be."—Booklist

"Black Ice is a devilish dive into an obsessed mind by a prolific German writer."—Kirkus Reviews, starred review

The cover cites Simenon and Highsmith in comparison. I'll not quibble with that."—Tangled Web

"A look into the individual's soul laid bare, into its abyss and its hopeless entanglements. Stories told along the razor-sharp edge of reality."—Die Zeit

Young lawyer Alexander Zabel has been pressured by the head of his law practice into defending the indefensible: a lying, power obsessed adulterer and ruthless industrialist accused of wrongfully dismissing his assistant and mistress. She is thirty-four; he, seventy-eight: a despot who has always had his way, now wheelchair-bound and dying of cancer. Alex must deal with a hopeless case, his growing sympathy for a repulsive client, and his sexual attraction to Klofft's elderly wife.

Less a thriller than an investigative and psychological cliffhanger, this novel examines how eroticism is somehow amplified by a sense of approaching death and presents insights into the corrosive desire for revenge, and the narrowing horizons of old age.

Hans Werner Kettenbach was born near Cologne. He published his first novel at the age of fifty. Previous jobs he has held include construction worker, court stenographer, football journalist, and foreign correspondent in New York. This is his third novel published by Bitter Lemon Press.

“Fast-paced and entrancing psychological thriller”—Booklist

"A portrait etched in acid of a Buenos Aires society menaced by economic and political crisis. Without value judgement but with light irony, Bizzio reveals the ugly secrets of a family, seen through the eyes of his naïve squatter. The imagery is often blinding and the dialogue pitch-perfect."—Le Temps

José María, a construction worker, is in love with Rosa, a maid in an exclusive Buenos Aires mansion. Subjected to constant humiliation by his foreman, José María kills him, then hides on an empty floor in the mansion. He silently observes the decadent behavior of the owners and watches Rosa in her most intimate moments. José María is also privy to more humiliating experiences—he watches as Rosa is raped by the young son of the family, and so he must kill again.

A metaphor for the decline of a social class, a country, and the resentment that spreads like a plague penetrating to the core of its people, Rage is also a tale of love and suspense that raises the tension with each successive page until it unavoidably shifts toward an intimate, shattering catastrophe. Humor, misfortune, shrewd social commentary, and thrilling erotic fantasy come together, offering the reader an inside vision of contemporary Argentina.

Film adaptation of Sergio Bizzio’s Rabia, produced by Guillermo del Toro and directed by Sebastián Cordero, was presented at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival.

Tito Ihaka, the unkempt, overweight Maori cop, was demoted to Sergeant due to insubordination and pigheadedness. He investigates the unsolved killing of a seventeen-year-old girl at an election night party in a ritzy villa near Auckland. Ihaka is also embroiled in a very personal mystery. A freelance journalist has stumbled across information that Ihaka's father, Jimmy, a trade union firebrand and renegade Marxist, didn't die of natural causes. The stories weave themselves into an exciting climax in an atmosphere of political maneuvering and intrigue surrounding the United States' confrontation with New Zealand over its anti-nuclear stance.

"It's the stuff the best gangster films are made of, perfectly composed, the action kept in the realm of reality and a steady, tense wire of human pathos running down its spine."—The Coast

"Tito Ihaka, the maverick Maori cop, dances through a minefield of police politics, old grudges, blackmail, and gangs as he hunts a faceless killer in Auckland. Filled with helter-skelter storylines, witty dialogue, and captivating characters."—Herald on Sunday

Paul Thomas, the godfather of contemporary New Zealand crime writing, often described by some as "Elmore Leonard on acid," has brought back offbeat local hero Detective Sergeant Tito Ihaka.

Maori cop Ihaka, unkempt, overweight, intemperate, unruly, unorthodox, and profane, is a cop unable to play the police politics necessary for promotion, but he's a man who has a way with women, and he's a stubborn investigator with an uncanny instinct for the truth.

Tito Ihaka is in the wilderness, having fallen foul of the new regime at Auckland Central. Called back to follow up a strange twist in the unsolved case that got him into trouble in the first place, Ihaka finds himself hunting a shadowy hitman who could have several notches on his belt.

His enemies want him off the case, but the bodies are piling up. Ihaka embarks on a quest to establish whether police corruption was behind the shooting of an undercover cop and—to complicate matters—he becomes involved with an enigmatic female suspect who could hold the key to everything.

“A scathing satire of Spanish society, hilarious dialogue, all beautifully dressed up as a crime novel.”—Krimi-Couch

“A first novel that’s spread like wildfire by word of mouth.”—El Avui

“Teresa Solana is great proof of the vitality of the roman noir in Catalan. . . . A wonderfully ironic hymn to the city of Barcelona.”—Diari de Balears

Another day in Barcelona, another slimy politician’s wife is suspected of infidelity. Lluis Font discovers a portrait of his wife in an exhibition that leads him to conclude he is being cuckolded by the artist. Concerned only about the potential political fallout, he hires twins Eduard and Pep, private detectives with a supposed knack for helping the wealthy with their “dirty laundry.” Their office is adorned with false doors leading to nonexistent private rooms, a mysterious secretary who is always away, and a broken laptop computer picked up on the street. The case turns ugly when Font’s wife is found poisoned by a marron glacé from a box of sweets delivered anonymously.

This is a deftly plotted, bitingly funny mystery novel. A satire of Catalan politics and a fascinating insight into the life and habits of Barcelona’s inhabitants, diurnal and nocturnal.

Teresa Solana lives in Barcelona. Born in 1962, she studied philosophy and worked as a literary translator and essayist. She has written several novels kept quietly in her drawer. A Not So Perfect Crime, her first published title, won the 2007 Brigada 21 Prize for the best Catalan mystery novel.

“Boisterous black comedy . . . funny and goodhearted, with much incident and expert enthusiasm for sex, food and drink.”—The Literary Review

“Much to enjoy in the clash of cultures and superstitions, even a tasty recipe for poisoning your friends with pasta. Detail like this places European crime writing on a par with its American counterpart.”—Belfast Independent

Some favors simply cannot be refused. Tonio agrees to write a love letter for Dario, a low-rent Paris gigolo. When Dario is murdered, a single bullet to the head, Tonio finds he has been left a small vineyard near Naples. The wine is undrinkable, but an elaborate scam has been set up. The smell of easy money attracts the unwanted attentions of the Mafia and the Vatican and the unbridled hatred of the locals. Mafiosi aren’t choir boys, and monsignors can be very much like Mafiosi.

Winner of three mystery prizes in one year, including the Grand Prix de la Littérature Policière and the Prix Mystère de la Critique.

Tonino Benacquista, born in France of Italian immigrants, dropped out of film studies to finance his writing career. After being in turn a museum watchman, a train guard on the Paris-Rome line and a professional parasite on the Paris cocktail circuit, he is now a highly successful author of fiction and film scripts.

Praise for Claudio Piñeiro:

"An agile novel, a ruthless dissection of a fast decaying society."—José Saramago, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature

"Thursday Night Widows is a gripping story. The dystopia portrayed is an indictment not solely of an assassin but of Argentina's class structure and the willful blindness of its petty bourgeoisie."—The Times Literary Supplement

Pablo Simó's life is a mess. His career as an architect is at a deadend; reduced to designing soulless office buildings desecrating the heart of Buenos Aires. His marriage seems to be one endless argument with his wife over the theatrics of their rebellious teenage daughter. To complicate matters, Pablo has long been attracted to sexy office secretary Marta Horvat, who is probably having an affair with his boss. Everything changes with the unexpected appearance of Leonor, a beautiful young woman who brings to light a crime that happened years before, a crime that everyone in the office wants forgotten, at all costs.

Claudia Piñeiro once again demonstrates her capacity to reveal the things hidden behind the facades of our existence; human relationships based on habit and cowardice, rather than love; on excessive ambition and personal gain, rather than morality.

Claudia Piñeiro, formerly a journalist and playwright, is the author of literary crime novels that are all bestsellers in Latin America and have been translated into many languages. A Crack in the Wall follows on the success of All Yours and Thursday Night Widows, both previously published by Bitter Lemon Press.

“The finest crime-fiction writer in the Spanish language...”--The London Times

“Full of atmosphere and descriptions to savour, this is as much a life-affirming tribute to Havana as a fine novel of death and detection.”--The Independent

“Police work is not merely a vocation but a metaphor for a futile yearning to solve the island’s deepest crimes and misdemeanours.”--Times Literary Supplement

Mario Conde has retired from the police force and makes a living trading in antique books. Havana is now flooded with dollars, populated by pimps, prostitutes, drug dealers, and other hunters of the night. In the book collection of a rich Cuban who fled after the fall of Batista, Conde discovers an article about Violeta del Rio, a beautiful bolero singer of the 1950s who disappeared mysteriously. A murder soon follows. This is a crime story set in today’s darker Cuba, but it is also an evocation of the Havana of Batista, the city of a hundred night clubs where the paths of Marlon Brando and Meyer Lansky crossed.

Probably Leonardo Padura’s best book, Havana Fever is many things: a suspenseful crime novel, a cruel family saga, and an ode to literature and his beloved, ravaged island.

“Despairing plot about the reality of madness and life, leavened with strong doses of bittersweet irony. The idiosyncratic investigation and its laconic detective haven’t aged one iota.”—Guardian

A child-murderer escapes from a Swiss insane asylum. The stakes get higher when Detective Sergeant Studer discovers the director’s body, neck broken, in the boiler room of the madhouse. The intuitive Studer is drawn into the workings of an institution that darkly mirrors the world outside. Even he cannot escape the pull of the no man’s land between reason and madness where Matto, the spirit of insanity, reigns.

Addicted to morphine, Friedrich Glauser spent much of his life in psychiatric wards and prison. He began writing mystery novels while an asylum inmate in 1935.

“At fifty the good Buddhist takes to the road, leaving all his belongings behind. His sole possession is a begging bowl. That’s how it should be. The problem was, there were four million dollars in my begging bowl and the mafia were after me. It was their money. They wanted it back, and they also wanted the girl, the woman who was with me: Sonia Kovalevskaya”.

Not only a thriller about murder and big money but also a powerful evocation of the cruel history that binds Russia and Germany.

Günter Ohnemus, born in 1946, lives in Munich and writes novels, essays and translations. This is his first novel to be translated into English.

"Strange and haunting, a gothic novel with a modern consciousness." —Philippa Gregory

"A haunting, sophisticated story about a woman discovering the truth about herself and the elusive, possibly illusive, nature of genius." —Sunday Times

"Mesmerizing, haunting, imbued with a complete sense of historical verisimilitude" —Times Literary Supplement

"A psychologically haunting and disturbing tale as full of mystery, exotic foreign places, and questions of parentage as any penned by her protagonist." —Library Journal

"Thrilling and heartbreaking, a gothic novel with emotional heart and depth." —Foreword Reviews

"A darkly mischievous novel about love, obsession and the burden of charisma, played out against the backdrop of Venice's watery, decadent glory." —Sarah Dunant

"A mesmerizing story of love and obsession in nineteenth-century Venice: dark and utterly compelling." —Natasha Solomons

Set in bustling Regency England and decaying Venice, A Man of Genius portrays a psychological journey from safety into secrecy and obsession. After a troubled childhood, Ann achieves independence earning her living as an author of Gothic novels. Within a group of male writers, she meets and is enthralled by the supposed poetic genius, Robert James. They become uneasy lovers. Ann and Robert travel from London through a Europe exhausted by the Napoleonic Wars. They arrive in a Venice of spies and intrigue, where their relationship becomes tortuous and Robert descends into near madness. Forced to flee with a stranger, Ann delves into her past to be jolted by a series of revelations about her lover, her parentage, the stranger, and herself.

Praise for the Havana Quartet:

“Overlaid with a rich smoky patina, an atmosphere that reeks of slums and riches, cigar smoke and exotic perfumes. Havana Black is a strong tasting book, a rich feast of wit and feeling.”—The Independent

“Drenched with that beguiling otherness so appealing to fans of mysteries of other cultures, it will also appeal to those who appreciate the sultry lyricism of James Lee Burke.”—Booklist

“A great plot, perfectly executed with huge atmosphere. You can almost smell the cigar smoke, rum and cheap women.”—Daily Mirror

“Havana Red, another winner from Bitter Lemon Press.”—The New York Times

Lieutenant Mario Conde is suffering from a terrible New Year’s Eve hangover. Though it’s the middle of a weekend, he is asked to urgently investigate the mysterious disappearance of Rafael Morin, a high-level business manager in the Cuban nomenklatura. Conde remembered Morin from their student days: good-looking, brilliant, a “reliable comrade’’ who always got what he wanted, including Tamara, the girl Conde was after.

But Rafael Morin’s exemplary rise from a poor barrio and picture-perfect life hides more than one suspicious episode worthy of investigation. While pursuing the case in a decaying but adored Havana, Conde confronts his lost love for Tamara and the dreams and illusions of his generation.

“Wonderfully terrifying novel from a leading thriller writer.”—Le Monde

When David Ninochvili arrives from war-torn Georgia, the peaceful existence of a schoolteacher’s family in Germany comes to an abrupt end. Christian Kestner has all but forgotten his stay in Tbilisi seven years before under Soviet rule, but when he receives a letter from David announcing his visit, he begins to worry. Why is David coming? To seek revenge for a relationship that Christian had with his wife? To conspire with one of the different factions now vying for the control of Georgia? Christian becomes intensely suspicious of David’s secretive ways, jealous of the Georgian’s attraction to his wife, and even resentful of his relationship with his teenage son. Fear turns into panic, a feeling so corrosive that it almost transforms this most rational individual into a monster.

Hans Werner Kettenbach came to writing late in life, publishing his first book at the age of fifty. His previous jobs include construction worker, court stenographer, football journalist, and foreign correspondent in New York. Five of his thrillers have been made into successful films, including Black Ice, previously published by Bitter Lemon Press.In 2009 he won the Glauser award (Germany's most prestigious crime writing prize) for lifetime literary achievement.

“A natural storyteller who, just like Patricia Highsmith, is interested in teasing out the catastrophes that result from the banal coincidences of daily life.”—Weltwoche

When Erika, an attractive local heiress, falls to her death near her lakeside villa, the police conclude it was a tragic accident. Scholten, a longtime employee of Erika’s, isn’t so sure. He knows a thing or two about the state of her marriage and suspects an almost perfect crime. Scholten’s maverick investigation into the odd, inexplicable details of the death scene soon buys him a ticket for a most dangerous ride.

This beautifully crafted thriller, set in a European world of small-town hypocrisy, was a bestseller made into the film Glatteis.

In 2009 Hans Werner Kettenbach won the Glauser award (Germany's most prestigious crime writing prize) for lifetime literary achievement.

Praise for Havana Red, the first of the Lt. Conde series:

“Another winner from Bitter Lemon…an innovative take on the traditional detective story. A macho cop whose investigation into the murder of a transvestite leads him to ruminate on his own attraction to this ‘philosophy of mimetics and erasure.’"—The New York Times

“A scorching novel from a star of Cuban fiction. Conde’s quest follows the basic rhythm of the whodunit, but Padura syncopates it with brilliant literary riffs on Cuban sex, society, religion, even food.”—Independent

The brutally mutilated body of Miguel Forcade is discovered washed up on a Havana beach. Head smashed in by a baseball bat, genitals cut off by a dull knife. Forcade was once responsible for the confiscation of art works from the bourgeoisie fleeing the revolution. Had he really returned from exile just to visit his ailing father?

The novel evokes the disillusion of a generation, many of them veterans of the war in Angola, discovering the corruption of those who preceded them. Yet it is a eulogy of Cuba, its life of music, sex and the great friendships of the people who elected to stay and fight for survival.

Leonardo Padura was born in 1955 in Havana and lives in Cuba. He is a prize-winning novelist, essayist, journalist, and scriptwriter.

For Victor Cox, a professor of film history, the Hollywood films noirs of the 1940s and 1950s are more real than his daily life. When his wife is found drowned, Cox is the first murder suspect. He falls in love with a student who looks like the 1920s film star Louise Brooks, but she disappears at a Belgian seaside resort. Smeared in lipstick in their hotel room are the words "No Sale," the same words Elizabeth Taylor wrote on a mirror in Butterfield 8. Subsequently, a series of gruesome killings of young women, all modeled on violent deaths in films that he knows and loves, lead the police back to Cox, who starts to doubt his own sanity and innocence.

With its stylish writing, pointed references to cinema classics, and blend of horror and humor, this is a powerful psychological thriller. It won the Diamond Bullet Award, the Edgar Award for Belgium.

Patrick Conrad, born in 1945 in Antwerp, is a Flemish poet, screenwriter, film director, and novelist. He lives in Provence, in the south of France. Limousine, a previous novel, is being made into a film with Kelsey Grammar, to be released in 2012.

Bangalore's Inspector Gowda is back in another nail-biting thriller. What does thirteen-year-old Nandita's disappearance have to do with the murder of a well-known lawyer in a gated community? Gowda is soon embroiled in the investigation of a child-trafficking racket. Negotiating insensitive laws, indifferent officials, and uncooperative witnesses, he is in a race against time to rescue Nandita from one of the most depraved criminal rings he has ever encountered.

Anita Nair lives in Bangalore and is an internationally acclaimed author and playwright. Her novel Ladies Coupe is a feminist classic, published in thirty languages.

Praise for the authors:

“Niccolò Ammaniti has written a deft masterpiece without a false note.”—Michel Dibdin, Guardian

“The Italy of Massimo Carlotto is a different world entirely, a dangerous setting for serious crimes committed by cruel men.”—The New York Times

“Andrea Camilleri writes with such vigor and wit that he deserves a place alongside Donna Leon, along with the additional advantage of an insider’s sense of authenticity.”—The Sunday Times

“A stunning tour de force from Carlo Lucarelli.”—The Sunday Telegraph

Italy’s best crime writers present nine gripping, often darkly humorous short stories with settings ranging from Milan to Palermo by way of Rome and even Guadeloupe. The mafia is not just Sicilian but also Albanian, Croatian, and Chinese.

These new stories are by Niccolò Ammaniti, Andrea Camilleri, Massimo Carlotto, Marcello Fois, Carlo Lucarelli, and others. These brilliant tales do not feature psychopathic cannibals or obscure, power-mad sects but ordinary criminals: a drug-addled cosmetic surgeon, inept blackmailers, and various other low-lifes lusting after easy money.

Italian crime writing is replacing that of Scandinavia as the fastest growing in the genre. The huge success of I’m Not Scared by Niccolò Ammaniti followed by the Gabriele Salvatore film of the same name took the United Kingdom and the United States by storm. Andrea Camilleri’s Inspector Montalban series (with seven popular titles in English so far), Carlo Lucarelli’s novels Almost Blue and Carte Blanche, and Massimo Carlotto’s The Goodbye Kiss are further evidence of this surge.

Harri Nykänen, born in Helsinki in 1953, was a well-known crime journalist before turning to fiction. He won the Finnish crime writing award The Clue in 1990 and in 2001. His fiction exposes the local underworld through the eyes of the criminal, the terrorist, and, most recently, from the point of view of an eccentric Helsinki police inspector.

Baghdad Central is a noir debut novel set in Baghdad in September 2003.

“Silky prose in this harrowing account of crime and punishment.”—Kirkus Reviews

“Using spare, effective prose, Chessex brilliantly renders both the inhospitable winter landscape of the mountains and the harshness of a society that makes monsters of its victims.’—London Review of Books

“A superb novel, hard as a winter in these landscapes of dark forests, where an atmosphere of prejudice and violence envelops the reader.”—L’Express

“It’s beautiful; it’s pure, like a blue sky over a black forest. Giono without garlic and olives.”—Le Point

“Far from just telling us a simple story Chessex has had the intelligence to integrate a dose of poetry, of the aesthetics of sin, and of the metaphysics of the monster.”—Lire

Jacques Chessex, winner of the prestigious Goncourt prize, takes a true story and weaves it into a lyrical tale of fear and cruelty.

1903, Ropraz, a small village near the Jura Mountains of Switzerland. On a howling December day, a lone walker discovers a recently opened tomb, the body of a young woman violated, her left hand cut off, genitals mutilated, and heart carved out. There is horror in the nearby villages: the return of atavistic superstitions and mutual suspicions. Then two more bodies are violated. A suspect must be found. Favez, a stableboy with bloodshot eyes, is arrested and placed in psychiatric care. He escapes, enlists in the Foreign Legion as the First World War begins, and is sent into battle in the trenches of the Somme.

Jacques Chessex, born in 1934, won the Prix Goncourt, France’s most prestigious literary prize for his novel A Father’s Love. He is considered one of Switzerland’s greatest living authors. He lives in Ropraz.

Winner of France's most prestigious literary award, the Prix Goncourt.

A haunting work, reminiscent of Albert Camus, that portrays with exquisite psychological detail the emotional crisis in the life of Jean Calmet, a young Swiss schoolteacher. As we watch the father's cremation in the opening chapter, we sense that, even though his father's body has been reduced to ashes, his spirit survives to haunt Jean. His father's prodigious vitality and virility had crushed his family and ruined his son's childhood. Even after his father's death, Jean cannot be free. The parental ogre's actions continue to suck Jean into a vortex of despair.

Jacques Chessex, a giant of Swiss literature, won the Grand Prix de la langue française and was awarded the Grand Prix Jean Giono for his entire work. Bitter Lemon Press published his novels The Vampire of Ropraz and A Jew Must Die to high acclaim. He died in 2009 at age seventy-five.

Praise for A Jew Must Die:

“Chessex, our new Flaubert, has no equal when describing horror without flinching, screaming sotto voce and exploring guilt in taut prose.”—Le Nouvel Observateur

“A masterpiece. Beauty of the world, ubiquity of evil, God’s silence, it’s all there, delivered like a slap to the face.”—Le Point

“A great author explores a nightmare not as anachronistic as it might appear.”—L’Hebdo

A novel based on a true story.

On April 16, 1942, a handful of Swiss Nazis in Payerne lure Arthur Bloch, a Jewish cattle merchant, into an empty stable and kill him with a crowbar. Europe is in flames, but this is Switzerland, and Payerne, a rural market town of butchers and bankers, is more worried about unemployment and local bankruptcies than the fate of nations across the border. Fernand Ischi, leader of the local Nazi cell, blames it all on the town’s Jewish population and wants to set an example, thinking the German embassy would be grateful. Ischi's dream of becoming the local gauleiter is shattered, however, when the milk containers used to dissimulate Bloch's body parts is discovered floating in a lake nearby, leading to his arrest.

Jacques Chessex, winner of the prestigious Prix Goncourt, is one of Switzerland’s greatest authors. He knew the murderers, went to school with their children, and has written a terse, implacable story that has awakened memories in a country that seems to endlessly rediscover dark areas of its past.

"Carofiglio writes crisp, ironical novels that are as much love stories and philosophical treatises as they are legal thrillers."—The New Yorker

"Raises the standard for crime fiction. Carofiglio's deft touch has given us a story that is both literary and gritty—and one that speeds along like the best legal thrillers. His insights into human nature—good and bad—are breathtaking." —Jeffery Deaver

The first in the Guido Guerrieri series.

A nine-year-old boy is found murdered at the bottom of a well near a popular beach resort in southern Italy. In what looks like a hopeless case for Guido Guerrieri, counsel for the defense, a Senegalese peddler is accused of the crime. Faced with small-town racism fuelled by the recent immigration from Africa, Guido attempts to exploit the esoteric workings of the Italian courts.

More than a perfectly paced legal thriller, this relentless suspense novel transcends the genre. A powerful attack on racism and a fascinating insight into the Italian judicial process, it is also an affectionate portrait of a deeply humane hero.

Gianrico Carofiglio, a member of the senate in Italy, was an anti-Mafia prosecutor in Bari, a port on the coast of Puglia. He has been involved with trials concerning corruption, organized crime, and the traffic of human beings. He has written four Guido Guerrieri novels, all bestsellers, having sold over two million copies worldwide.

Praise for Ben Pastor's Lumen:

“Pastor’s plot is well crafted, her prose sharp. . . . A disturbing mix of detection and reflection.”—Publishers Weekly

"Rivets the reader with its twist of historical realities. A historical piece, it faithfully reproduces the grim canvas of war. A character study, it captures the thoughts and actions of real people, not stereotypes.”—The Free Lance-Star

“And don’t miss Lumen by Ben Pastor. . . . An interesting, original, and melancholy tale.”—Literary Review

Italy, September 1943. The Italian government switches sides and declares war on Germany. The north of Italy is controlled by the fascist puppets of Germany; the south liberated by Allied forces fighting their way up the peninsula.

Having survived hell on the Russian front, Wehrmacht major and aristocrat Baron Martin von Bora is sent to Verona. He is ordered to investigate the murder of a prominent local fascist: a bizarre death threatening to discredit the regime’s public image. The prime suspect is the victim’s twenty-eight-year-old widow Clara.

Haunted by his record of opposition to SS policies in Russia, Bora must watch his step. Against the backdrop of relentless anti-partisan warfare and the tragedy of the Holocaust, a breathless chase begins.

Ben Pastor, born and now back in Italy, lived for thirty years in the United States, working as a university professor in Vermont. The first in the Martin Bora series, Lumen, was published by Bitter Lemon Press in May 2011.

The first in the Stratos Gazis mystery series and the first time this Greek novelist is available in English.

Stratos hates being called a hitman. A conscientious fixer is what he is. He fixes problems that very few can deal with. Things that people are willing to pay handsomely to get done, without wanting to know about the small stuff. Stratos is their man, provided that his meticulous research shows him that the targets deserve their fate.

But now, in the midst of the Greek economic and political crisis, this film-noir loving assassin takes on the highest-profile case of his career. He finds himself caught between the most beloved lawyer in Greece, known as "the guardian of the poor," and his actress wife, the most desirable woman in the country. They are both in dire need of his killing services, but which one is telling the truth? Helped by three childhood friends—Costas Dragas, a homicide cop; Teri, a transsexual high-class hooker; and Maria, the passion of his life—he discovers that truth, in shattered loves and broken families, is, as ever, a relative thing.

Pol Koutsakis, born in Crete in 1974, writes novels, plays, and screenplays. Athenian Blues is his first novel to be translated into English. Baby Blue, the sequel to Athenian Blues, is expected to be published by Bitter Lemon Press in 2018.

“A wonderful portrait of a woman both imperial and bruised, a greying ravaged mother-wolf that still controls all those around her. A novel of rhythm and grace, a beautiful voyage with the gypsies.”—Le Monde

The story of Angelina, a gypsy matriarch, whose tribe is exiled to the outskirts of a French city. A young librarian comes to introduce the children to books and stories. She gradually gains their confidence and accompanies them through an eventful and tragic year. Ferney’s distinctive style powerfully involves the reader in the family’s disasters, its comic moments, in the love lives of the five boys, the bravery of the children, and, eventually, in Angelina’s final gesture of defiance.

Winner of the literary prize Culture et Bibliothèques.

Praise for Friedrich Glauser’s other Sergeant Studer novels:
“Thumbprint is a fine example of the craft of detective writing in a period which fans will regard as the golden age of crime fiction.”—The Sunday Telegraph

“In Matto’s Realm is both a compelling mystery and an illuminating, finely wrought mainstream novel.”—Publishers Weekly

“A despairing plot about the reality of madness and life, leavened with strong doses of bittersweet irony. The idiosyncratic investigation of In Matto’s Realm and its laconic detective have not aged one iota.”—Guardian

“With good reason, the German-language prize for detective fiction is named after Glauser. . . . He has Simenon’s ability to turn a stereotype into a person, and the moral complexity to appeal to justice over the head of police procedure.”—The Times Literary Supplement

When two women are “accidentally” killed by gas leaks, Sergeant Studer investigates the thinly disguised double murder in Bern and Basel. The trail leads to a geologist dead from a tropical fever in a Moroccan Foreign Legion post and a murky oil deal involving rapacious politicians and their henchmen. With the help of a hashish-induced dream and the common sense of his stay-at-home wife, Studer solves the multiple riddles on offer. But assigning guilt remains an elusive affair.

The third in the Sergeant Studer series.

Praise for the Ariel Kafka series:

"Ariel Kafka wins the award for most intriguing name for a fictional detective, and it suits this impressively labyrinthine mystery series." —Time Out

"The clever combination of classic Jewish themes with the traditions of Nordic crime makes for a refreshing tale with wide appeal. And the subtle humor makes it even better." —Booklist

"Professional responsibility and ethnic affiliation clash in Nykänen's intriguing first novel. The resolution will satisfy noir fans." —Publishers Weekly

The third in the Ariel Kafka series.

There are two Jewish cops in all of Helsinki. One of them, Ariel Kafka, a lieutenant in the Violent Crime Unit, identifies himself as a policeman first, then a Finn, and lastly a Jew. Kafka is a stubborn, dedicated policeman with wry sense of humor, always willing to risk his career to get an answer. A woman's body scrawled with religious texts is found in a Helsinki apartment. It turns out she wasn't murdered: the body was stolen from the morgue. The body is stolen again, and this time is immolated in a funeral pyre in Helsinki's Central Park. Kafka finds himself investigating a series of crimes leading to the enigmatic Christian Brotherhood of the Holy Vault. But before he can solve the puzzle, more than one Brother must pay for past sins with his life.

Harri Nykänen, born in Helsinki in 1953, is a prize-winning mystery writer. This is the third in the Ariel Kafka series. It exposes the local underworld through the eyes of an eccentric Helsinki police inspector.

After Joel Dicker, here is the latest literary sensation from Switzerland: brilliant twenty-five-year-old novelist Quentin Mouron with his first mystery novel, which garnered ecstatic reviews in the French-speaking world. This is the first time his work is available in English.

Three Drops of Blood and a Cloud of Cocaine is a darkly humorous literary and psychological mystery set in a Boston still suffering from the consequences of the financial crisis.

Written with the pace and controlled violence of the very best Tarantino film

When old Jimmy Henderson is found murdered in his Ford pick-up truck in a suburb of Boston, Sheriff Paul McCarthy takes charge of the investigation. Soon, Franck, a young private detective visiting from New York, also takes an interest in the case.

Breaking the conventions of the genre, the novel holds a satirical mirror to our society by entering the minds of two men right on the edge of sanity. Sheriff McCarthy, a church-going man, desperately trying to keep a boundary between the sordidness of his investigations and his private life. And Franck, a violent, decadent dandy, always rushing to the bathroom for another line of coke, revealing the darker workings of the case with a blood curdling laugh. When the two men finally meet the entire existence of the sheriff as a righteous family man – and probably as a police officer -- will be turned on its head.


“Mouron is a revelation. He juggles characters with ease in a seamy world perfectly evoked, and all of it is done in a taut high-tempo style. “ HuffPost

“Three Drops follows the US tradition of the searing social novel, literary, troubling, to be read in one sitting. It leaves a bitter and vivid after-taste, like the morning after a sleepless night.” Le Temps

“A splendid reminder of the virtues of the traditional novel, this work tackles the territory of Balzac and Zola, not just in the solidity of its construction and characters, but in its readiness to tackle corruption in church and state.”-The Independent, UK

"In contrast with Mankell, the warm-hearted psychologist of the individual, we find Geeraerts, a cold-blooded surgeon who lays bare the ills of a society. This thriller, so loyal to the genre that the irony and parody are barely perceptible, is relentless.”—Tagesspiegel Berlin

“One of Geeraerts’ literary achievements is that such an arrogant and baroque character as Savelkoul ends up attracting your sympathy. A revealing study of a very dark society.”—Facts Zurich

“Geeraerts exposes the mechanics of corruption, the abuse of power, political cynicism and the excesses triggered by religious delusion.”—ZDF

Albert Savelkoul, the public prosecutor of Antwerp, has power, money, an aristocratic wife, and a high-maintenance mistress. A wonderful life—until Opus Dei takes a less than benevolent interest in it. In the course of this subversive psychological thriller, the shameless, slippery Albert becomes an almost-lovable, desperate victim of a power structure controlled by effete aristocrats, a corrupt judiciary, and ultra-right fanatics of the Catholic church.

Jef Geeraerts, born in 1930 in Antwerp, was much admired by Henry Miller and is Belgium's best-known author after Georges Simenon. He was educated in Jesuit schools and spent time as a colonial administrator and army officer in the Belgian Congo. He gained international acclaim with his Gangrene Cycle, four novels based on his experience in the Congo. Since then he has focused on crime and noir novels, of which The Public Prosecutor is the first to be published in English.

Praise for Esmahan Aykol:

"Kati could be the love child of Miss Marple and NPR's Andrei Codrescu. It doesn't matter who done it. What matters is that Aykol uses the genre to tell us more about the world than we're used to."—Newsday

"An offbeat amateur sleuth with a distinctive narrative voice. Fans of Amanda Cross's Kate Fansler and Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher will find a lot to like."—Publishers Weekly

Kati owns Istanbul's only mystery book store and, as usual, gets involved in a case that is none of her business. Every day, a beautiful woman lunches alone in the restaurant next to the bookstore. When the woman is found dead in her apartment, Kati immediately recognizes the stranger from the restaurant in images in the newspaper photos. Although the police believe it was an accident, Kati suspects something more sinister has happened.

Sani Ankaraligil was an attractive young woman and a politically active ecologist in the middle of a divorce from her wealthy husband. So who would benefit from her death? The industrial companies Sani had accused of polluting the rivers of western Turkey, or her jealous husband seeking revenge through an honor killing, or a Thracian separatist group? The investigation pulls Kati into murkier waters: the marriage may have been a sham, designed to cover up Sani's husband's homosexuality . . . the role of her mother-in-law goes from distasteful to outright criminal.

Praise for Friedrich Glauser’s other Sergeant Studer novels:

“Fever is a deviously plotted procedural. Not many can outdo Friedrich Glauser.”—The New York Times

“This gem contains echoes of Dürrenmatt, Fritz Lang’s film M and Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain. Both a compelling mystery and an illuminating finely wrought mainstream novel, Matto’s Realm will make it clear to American readers why the German language prize for detective fiction is named after Glauser.”—Publishers Weekly

“Thumbprint is a fine example of the craft of detective writing in a period which fans will regard as the golden age of crime fiction.”—The Sunday Telegraph

This is the fifth, and last, novel in the much-acclaimed Sergeant Studer series. Why must the festive dinner in the Hirschen Inn be interrupted? A murder puts an end to the wedding celebration of Studer’s daughter. A man is found with a sharpened bicycle spoke embedded in his back, and a suspect is quickly arrested—a bit too quickly, thinks Studer. Property speculation, usury, and betrayed love find their way into this tightly written mystery novel that calls on Studer’s intuitive, often absurd, yet efficient police methods.

The Spoke, a European crime classic, was first published in 1937. It has been translated into six languages. This is its first publication in English.

Friedrich Glauser is a legendary figure in European crime writing. He was a morphine and opium addict much of his life and began writing crime novels while he was an inmate at the Swiss insane asylum Waldau.

“A splendid job...Those who appreciate intelligent writing and emotionally plausible characters will be rewarded.”—Publishers Weekly

“Noort cranks up the tension with skill to produce a truly gripping nightmare.” —Sunday Telegraph

Praise for Saskia Noort:

'A mystery writer of the heart as much as of the mind, a balance that marks her work with a flesh-and-blood humanity.'—Andrew Pyper, author of The Wildfire Season

“Affairs, deceit, manipulation, tax dodges and murder—-there’s nothing Noort shies away from stirring into the mix, nicely showing off the sinister side of the suburbs.”—Time Out

“While there are echoes of Desperate Housewives here, this is closer to Mary Higgins Clark and is a good bet for her fans.”-—Library Journal

Maria has money problems, two children from a failed marriage, and a depressive boyfriend. When she becomes pregnant, she decides not to keep the baby and then the letters start to arrive. Threatening letters, from pro-life activists she thinks at first, but then she begins to suspect others—even her own boyfriend. She flees to her sister’s house, redolent with memories of a childhood she does not want to revisit. As the death threats follow her to her hiding place, Maria begins to fear not only for her life but for her own sanity.

This is relentless suspense writing; it is a description of Maria’s hellish descent into a world of induced paranoia that ends with a narrow escape from a carefully planned murder.

Saskia Noort, born in 1967, is an acclaimed author of literary thrillers and international bestsellers. She has sold over a million copies of her first three novels and splits her time between the Netherlands and a Spanish island retreat.

"An agile novel written in a language perfectly pitched for the subject matter, a ruthless dissection of a fast decaying society"—José Saramago, Nobel Prize winner

The English translation of hit novel Las Viudas de Los Jueves!

“Piñeiro’s clever U.S. debut.. . illuminates the hypocrisies of the country's upper classes after 9/11.”—Publishers Weekly

“Piñeiro is particularly skilful at exposing the social forces undermining Argentine society, and the fragility of personal relationships. We learn the surprising truth of the three men’s death in the final chapter; the build-up to it is riveting.”—The Times (London)

"Piñeiro builds up tension through banal, domestic details and the accretion of despair in everyday marital and professional struggles. There may be bloody murder at the centre of this novel, but the dystopia portrayed is an indictment not solely of an assassin but of Argentina’s class structure and the willful blindness of its petty bourgeoisie."—Times Literary Supplement

“A razor-sharp psychological and social portrait not only of Argentina, but of the afluent Western world as a whole.”—Rosa Montero

Three bodies lie at the bottom of a swimming pool in a gated country estate near Buenos Aires. It's Thursday night at the magnificent Scaglia house. Behind the locked gates, shielded from the crime, poverty, and filth of the people on the streets, the Scaglias and their friends hide lives of infidelity, alcoholism, and abusive marriage. Claudia Piñeiro's novel eerily foreshadowed a criminal case that generated a scandal in the Argentine media. But this is more than a story about crime. The suspense is a byproduct of Piñeiro's hand at crafting a psychological portrait of a professional class that lives beyond its means and leads secret lives of deadly stress and despair. It takes place during the post-9/11 economic meltdown in Argentina, but it is a universal story that will resonate among credit-crunched readers of today.

The film of Thursday Night Widows, by Argentine New Wave and award-winning director Marcelo Piñeyro is coming soon with trailers available online.

Claudia Piñeiro was a journalist, playwright, and television scriptwriter and in 1992 won the prestigious Pléyade Annual Journalism Award. She has more recently turned to fiction and is the author of literary crime novels that are all bestsellers in Latin America and have been translated into four languages. This novel won the Clarin Prize for fiction and is her first title to be available in English.

Praise for Holy Smoke, the first in the Antoine series:

“A terrific black comedy …both a blasphemously funny satire of provincial Italian chicanery and a wry acknowledgment of the ambivalence that ambitious immigrants feel about their roots.”—The New York Times

“Unexpected deadly demands made in the name of friendship inspire the plot of this quirky mystery novel. Irreverently inveighs against romantic love, cancer and the Paris suburbs.”—The Washington Post

“An iconoclastic chronicle of small-time crooks and desperate capers, with added Gallic and Italian flair. Wonderful fun.”—Guardian

Antoine, a fanatic billiards player, is asked to watch over a Paris art gallery. When he scuffles with a thief a statue falls and severs his right hand. His maverick investigation leads to the discovery of a series of gruesome killings. Soon Antoine finds himself the prime suspect in the murder of a gallery owner. A game of billiards decides the outcome of this satirical tale which brilliantly captures the world of modern art and the parasites that infest it.

After being, in turn, a museum night-watchman, and a train guard on the Paris-Rome line, Tonino Benacquista is now a highly successful author of fiction and film scripts.

"The role of Guido Guerrieri is to take on impossible cases that have little chance of success. The lawyer accepts the case only because he's fallen in lust with the prisoner's wife; his efforts to prove his client's innocence bring him into dangerous conflict with Mafia interests. Everything a legal thriller should be."—The Times

Counsel for the defense Guido Guerrieri is asked to handle the appeal of Fabio Paolicelli, who has been sentenced to sixteen years for drug smuggling. The odds are stacked against the accused: not only the fact that he initially confessed to the crime but also his past as a neo-Fascist thug. It is only the intervention of Paolicelli's beautiful half-Japanese wife that finally overcomes Guerrieri's reluctance. Matters are further complicated when Guerrieri ends up in bed with her.

This book is hard-boiled and sun-dried in equal parts. Where Philip Marlowe would be knocking back bourbon and listening to the snap of fist on jaw, Guerrieri prefers Sicilian wine and Leonard Cohen. The local color is complemented by snappy legal procedural writing which sends the reader tumbling through the clockwork of a tightly wound plot.

Gianrico Carofiglio, a member of the Senate in Italy, was an anti-Mafia prosecutor in Bari, a port on the coast of Puglia. He has been involved with trials concerning corruption, organized crime, and human trafficking. He has written four Guido Guerrieri novels, all bestsellers, having sold over a million copies worldwide.

The setting for this witty and insightful debut crime novel is a Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, family hotel. Rio is the perfect backdrop with its history of military dictatorship, drug wars, child gangs, and violent policing tactics.

The decapitated body of a hotel resident is found. The eyes have been removed from the head, casually left on the floor of the room. The victim's eerie, frozen Mona Lisa smile seems to indicate that the murderer had been received as a friend.

According to the police, the victim was stabbed in the heart and died before the decapitation. As the investigation continues, with few leads or clues worth pursuing, other hotel clients are found dead; all decapitated, usually with the head found delicately balanced on their knees.

This classical crime novel provides an opportunity for Frei Betto (a Dominican friar, once a political prisoner, a union activist, and then an adviser to President Lula da Silva) to describe Brazilian society, especially those left at its edge, like Rio's favela children, abused, hunted-down, but also addicted to drugs and violent crime.

The book tells the fascinating back stories of the hotel residents, suspects, and eventual victims, such as the maid who dreams of making it in television soaps, and the female pimp who has survived incestuous rape, while being faithful to a suspenseful intrigue that could have been thought up by Ruth Rendell.

Brazil will receive much attention as host of the 2014 Football World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.

“Breathless pace. Touches effortlessly on identity, love, alcohol, and the cynicism of the business world.”—Les Echos

Who hasn’t wanted to become “someone else”? Over a drink in Paris, two men give each other three years to see which one can more radically alter his life. Blin becomes a private detective. He takes on a new identity, even a surgically altered face. Gredzinski, a self-effacing corporate executive, discovers liquor that evening and rapidly yields to the sensuality and self-confidence induced by alcoholism. Things get complicated when Blin is hired by an ex-lover to find himself and when Gredzinski secretly follows his girlfriend to her home. A helter-skelter tale of humor and suspense.

Winner of the literary prize RTL-Lire.

The fifth in the Martin Bora WWII mystery series. In May 1941, Wehrmacht officer Bora is sent to Crete, recently occupied by the German army, and must investigate the brutal murder of a Red Cross representative befriended by SS-Chief Himmler. All the clues lead to a platoon of trigger-happy German paratroopers, but is this the truth?

Bora takes to the mountains of Crete to solve the case, navigating his way between local bandits and foreign resistance fighters. With echoes of Claus von Stauffenberg, Bora is torn between his duty as an officer and his integrity as a human being.

Praise for the Havana Quartet:

“Havana Red, another winner from Bitter Lemon Press.”—The New York Times

“Overlaid with a rich smoky patina, an atmosphere that reeks of slums and riches, cigar smoke and exotic perfumes.”—The Independent

“Talk about unexpected discoveries, the Havana Quartet is a revelation. With a nod to Key Largo and a virtual bow to The Maltese Falcon, these novels are ultimately about the redemptive nature of undying friendship and the potentially destructive nature of undying love.”—The Atlantic Monthly

“Drenched with that beguiling otherness so appealing to fans of mysteries of other cultures, it will also appeal to those who appreciate the sultry lyricism of James Lee Burke.”—Booklist

The fourth title of the prize-winning Havana Quartet.

Twenty-four-year-old Lissette Delgado was beaten, raped, and then strangled with a towel. Marijuana is found in her apartment and her wardrobe is suspiciously beyond the means of a high school teacher. Lieutenant Conde is pressured by “the highest authority” to conclude this investigation quickly when chance leads him into the arms of a beautiful redhead, a saxophone player who shares his love for jazz and fighting fi sh.

This is a Havana of crumbling, grand buildings, secrets hidden behind faded doors, and corruption. For an author living in Cuba, Leonardo Padura is remarkably outspoken about the failings of Fidel Castro’s regime. Yet this is a eulogy of Cuba, its life of music, sex, and the great friendships of those who elected to stay and fight for survival.

When Judge Larocca is accused of corruption, Guerrieri goes against his better instincts and takes the case. Helped by Annapaola Doria, a motorbike-riding bisexual private detective who keeps a baseball bat on hand for sticky situations, he investigates the alleged links to the mafia. Of course Guerrieri cannot stop himself from falling for Annapaola's exotic charms.

The novel is a suspenseful legal thriller but it is also much more. It is the story of a judge who, to quote Dostoevsky, "lies to himself and listens to his own lies, so gets to the point where he can no longer distinguish the truth, either in himself or around himself."

A severed head is found on the Greek border near a wall planned to stop Middle Eastern immigrants crossing from Turkey. Intelligence Agent Evangelos wants the truth about the murder, human trafficking into Greece, and about the corruption surrounding the wall's construction. It is a mystery novel and a political thriller but more importantly it evokes the problems of the West incarnated in Greece: isolationism, fear of immigration, economic collapse, and corruption. While dark, it is also poetic and paints an indelible portrait of Athens, with its mixed fragrances of eucalyptus, freshly baked bread, and cigarette smoke.

“A spine-tingling novel that keeps you mesmerized from beginning to end.”—InfiniteStorie

“Morozzi has a light touch. He has an uncanny ability to convey mood swings, excitement and plot twists with ever increasing velocity.”—Gazzetta di Parma

“A chilling and claustrophobic thriller with an unpredictable ending. Morozzi joins the best in the genre.”—LINUS

Bologna in August: unbearable heat, an empty city. Claudia is a young student in a hurry to return home from her work as a waitress and get out of the skimpy uniform she hates. Tomas is a young man on his way to elope to Amsterdam with his girlfriend, Francesca. Aldo is a husband and father with an uncanny resemblance to Elvis Presley, anxious to get to an apartment filled with guilty secrets. All three have an urgent need to be somewhere else. Instead, they are trapped in an elevator in a deserted building on a holiday weekend. They are like three wasps in an upturned glass . . . and one of the trio is a serial killer.

This dark, twist-packed psychological thriller in the style of Phonebooth has been adapted as a US film to be released in the fall of 2008, starring Amber Tamblyn and directed by cult Mexican auteur Rigoberto Castañeda.

Gianluca Morozzi was born in Bologna in 1971, where he lives today. He is well-known as a cutting-edge satirist and music critic, often compared to Nick Hornby and Ben Elton. Blackout is his first thriller.

Praise for the Martin Bora series:

"The tone of Liar Moon has a flu-like grimness, appropriate the 1943 setting. Pastor is excellent at providing details (silk stockings, movie magazines, cigarettes) that light up the setting."—Booklist

"Lumen's plot is well crafted, her prose shap . . . a disturbing mix of detection and reflection."—Publisher's Weekly

Rome, 1944. While the Allies are fighting their way up the Italian peninsula, Rome lives the last days of Nazi occupation. Their world is falling apart as the German Army, the Gestapo, and the SS vie for power while holding glittering and debauched parties. But this is also a time of Italian partisan attacks, arrests, and mass executions, all to the sound of Allied artillery bombardment just outside the walls of the city.

Baron Martin von Bora, an officer in the Wehrmacht, has the complex and delicate task of solving not one, but three murders. A young German embassy secretary has "accidentally" fallen to her death from a fourth-floor window, and a Roman society lady and a headstrong cardinal of the Roman Curia are found dead in her apartment. The cardinal is personally known to Bora and, like the officer, secretly active in the resistance against the Third Reich. With Italian police inspector Sandro Guidi at his side, Bora sets off to establish the truth. Different as they are, the two men confront crime, war, and dictatorship in the awareness that the dignity of man comes at a price beyond all imagination.

“Pelletier is a wonderful storyteller. She is a master of funny, bittersweet dialogue. A classic roman noir hero, the world weary inspector, is completely reinvented.”—Le Monde

The naked bodies of a male dancer and a young girl are found entwined backstage in the Moulin Rouge. A junkie is killed, his throat chewed open, the teeth marks human. Seemingly unconnected, these deaths form a sinister pattern involving crack dealers and shady property deals.

Inspector Maurice Less is plagued by a female boss who bombards him with tales of her sexual exploits. Together they uncover a trail of fear and broken dreams that reaches from Corsica into the heart of Paris.

Winner of the Grand Prix du Roman Noir de Cognac.