Books.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.
Overview
A provocative literary thriller that playfully pays tribute to classic tales of mystery and adventure
Lucas Corso is a book detective, a middle-aged mercenary hired to hunt down rare editions for wealthy and unscrupulous clients. When a well-known bibliophile is found dead, leaving behind part of the original manuscript of Alexandre Dumas's The Three Musketeers, Corso is brought in to authenticate the fragment. He is soon drawn into a swirling plot involving devil worship, occult practices, and swashbuckling derring-do among a cast of characters bearing a suspicious resemblance to those of Dumas's masterpiece. Aided by a mysterious beauty named for a Conan Doyle heroine, Corso travels from Madrid to Toledo to Paris on the killer's trail in this twisty intellectual romp through the book world.
When a well-known bibliophile is found hanged, Lucas Corso is brought in to authenticate a fragment of a manuscript purported to be "The Three Musketeers." He is soon drawn into a swirling plot involving devil worship, occult practices, and a swashbuckling cast that bears a suspicious resemblance to those in the famous work. Abridged. 5 CDs.
Synopsis
When a well-known bibliophile is found hanged, Lucas Corso is brought in to authenticate a fragment of a manuscript purported to be "The Three Musketeers." He is soon drawn into a swirling plot involving devil worship, occult practices, and a swashbuckling cast that bears a suspicious resemblance to those in the famous work. Abridged. 5 CDs.
New York Newsday
A stunner...an eerie, erudite mystery.
Editorials
Chicago Tribune
Plenty of thrills...Perez-Reverte pulls it all together with elegance.New York Newsday
A stunner...an eerie, erudite mystery.New York Daily News
A cross between Umberto Eco and Anne Rice...a beach book for intellectuals. -- New York Daily NewsKirkus Reviews
An intricate and very bookish mystery novel—set, in fact, in the rarefied world of book collecting and dealing—from the sophisticated Spanish author of The Flanders Panel (1994, not reviewed).The story begins with the hiring of professional "book- hunter" Lucas Corso by Boris Balkan, a translator and collector who seeks authentication of a handwritten manuscript chapter of Alexandre Dumas's The Three Musketeers that has fortuitously, as they say, come into his possession. Traveling back and forth between Paris and Madrid, Corso matches wits with Liana Taillefer, whose husband's suicide was somehow connected with his ownership of the Delomelanicon, an illustrated medieval volume said to contain secret instructions for summoning the devil, and of which only two other copies are known to exist. Corso is soon involved in a byzantine international intrigue carried on by those who want, or have information about, the Dumas chapter and the infernal Delomelanicon, including: urbane and ruthless bookseller Varo Borja; an aged German baroness; a threatening man with a facial scar whom his quarry Corso bemusedly nicknames "Rochefort" (after Dumas); and a preternaturally self-possessed teenaged girl who says she's Irene Adler (this being the name of Sherlock Holmes's most infamous mystery woman). Pérez-Reverte plaits all these teasing strands together with imperturbable skill, leaving the reader wondering until almost the final pages about the significance of his seductive title, and the allegation that Alexandre Dumas's narrative genius was the result of his pact with Satan. A lot happens in this novel, despite its constant recourse to prearranged meetings and extended conversations, and its enormity of detail about the nuts and bolts of book manufacture, publishing, searching, and dealing.
Bibliophiles will love this witty and clever fabrication, though its very specialized content may place it just outside the range of the general reader.