An engrossing and intricate tale, this murder thriller won a Gold Dagger for Best Crime Novel. It weaves together two intersecting periods spanning half a century of history, politics and social change. In the late 1990s, a teenage girl’s body was found dumped onto the Paço de Arcos beach, just south of Lisbon. The affable and very human Inspector Zé Coehlo, a widower living with his own teenage daughter, is drafted into the case. Because the affluent parents of Catarina Sousa Oliveira had reported her missing, the victim’s identity is quickly established, but how could the death of such a young woman have resulted from events in Portugal more than 50 years ago?
It is not for another 450 quickly turned pages that motive and murderer are finally realised. To comprehend the network of intrigues which have cemented the future, we are cast back to Germany in its ebullient but vicious early war days in 1941 as well as deep into Portugal’s mountainous Beira region in the same period. Portugal’s neutrality in WWII was clear, but its natural supply of wolfram (tungsten, a shiny white and very tough metal) was of compelling interest for Hitler’s blitzkreig.
Wilson’s novel is based on historical fact, but the fictional characters he presents are often less than honourable people operating in adverse and murky times. They are not loveable, but give a tour of the human condition – and if you want to read deeply enough, into the disturbing effects of war. Yet, as such, they provide a great foil for a read of adventure, greed, expediency, revenge, and, as often as not, simply trying to cope or to gain a toehold onto an allusive safety wire.
Except for an ever so slightly placid beginning, the many historical flashback episodes travel at a fine clip until turning into a sheer gallop at the end to see how events and characters relate. Like a master puppeteer, at the last moment, Wilson pulls together the multilevel strings of the taut plot.
Review by Janet Johnstone
