This is the third crime novel Hewson has set in Rome and for me it is much the best. The same central characters feature in each. This seems to have shades of The Da Vinci Codeto it as a murdered woman’s back has the design of Leonardo Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man carved into it. However it becomes something very different, very topical, very sad and very important. An emotional story that needs to be read.
A horrific murder pitches Nic Costa and his team into a collision with US agents - and a secret that has festered for fifteen years.
The snow is falling on the ancient streets of Rome. And in the heart of the city, under the Pantheon's great dome, a woman's body lies on the marble floor, carefully positioned with a gruesome carving on her back.
Arriving at the scene, Detective Nic Costa is unprepared for what he finds, nor for the intervention of US agents with a take-no-prisoners style and a shocking story to tell: the killer has struck before, in monuments all over the world, leaving the same cryptic message carved onto the bodies of the victims.
As the murder leads to more grisly slayings and the team of veteran Roman cops clash with the Americans, Nic is pulled into a harrowing search for the truth...a search that will take him into a shocking conspiracy - and a dark episode in a nation's long-forgotten past.
David Hewson was born in Yorkshire in 1953. He was a journalist from the age of seventeen, working most recently for the Sunday Times. In addition to travel books, he has written a number of novels including nine titles in the Detective Nic Costa series set mostly in Rome. The author lives in Kent.
