Vanished Hands

A suspicious suicide calls Javier Falcón to a wealthy neighborhood on the outskirts of Seville in this sensational follow-up to Robert Wilson's thriller The Blind Man of Seville. Falcón begins to investigate a case with no solid evidence when suddenly, in quick succession, two more suicides occur-one of them a fellow police officer in the sex crimes unit. Left to discover what made life so unbearable for these victims, Falcón must find the connection among the suicides. As his investigation deepens, so too does suspicion that perhaps these deaths aren't suicides after all, and the mystery takes a shocking, explosive turn.

"Wilson builds a many-layered portrait of survivors and perpetrators, each consumed by rage, guilt, or depression."—The Boston Globe

In an exclusive suburb of Seville, Rafael Vega lies dead on the kitchen floor and his wife has been suffocated under her own pillow. It appears to be a suicide pact, but Inspector Jefe Javier Falcón has his doubts.

In the brutal summer heat Falcón starts to untangle the mystery of Rafael Vega when he receives threats from the Russian mafia who have begun operating in the city. Within days two further suicides follow - one of them a senior policeman - and a forest fire rages through the hills above Seville, obliterating all in its path. Falcón must now sweat out the truth, revealing that all these events are connected and that there is one more secret in the black heart of Vega's life.

Robert Wilson is the author of seven novels, including A Small Death in Lisbon, which won the Gold Dagger Award as Best Crime Novel of 1999 from Britain's Crime Writers Association. He divides his time between Portugal and Oxford, England.

Publishers Weekly

In Wilson's intricate police procedural set in Seville, Spain-the second to feature introspective detective Javier Falcon-a wealthy couple is found dead in their home: Lucia Vega has been suffocated in her own bed; her husband, construction magnate Rafael Vega, is lying on the kitchen floor, poisoned, with a cryptic note in his hand. Is it a murder-suicide-or something more sinister? Falcon's subsequent investigation reveals a vast criminal conspiracy involving the Russian mafia (crime writing's new favorite bad guys) and human trafficking for prostitution and child pornography (crime writing's new favorite transgressions). As usual, Wilson deftly deploys a vast cast of characters, from an ex-pat American couple to a popular Spanish actor, and spins his trademark web of corruption and deceit. But while Falcon is consistently compelling, struggling with his internal demons and with the challenge of ridding Seville of its moral bankruptcy, the plot itself is too complex to really be engaging. In addition, too many references to the first Falcon novel, The Blind Man of Seville, will confuse new readers. The story of one young Russian prostitute-she's promised a job as a waitress in Portugal and ends up working the streets in Spain-is a chilling reminder of the evil that men do, but her frightening tale is lost in the convoluted story. Agent, Anthony Sheil at Gillon Aitken. (Jan. 3) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

ROBERT WILSON is the author of nine previous novels, including A Small Death in Lisbon and The Company of Strangers. A graduate of Oxford University, he has worked in shipping, advertising, and trading in Africa, and has lived in Greece and West Africa.