Carlo Lucarelli

Pitch-black Italian Noir, set in 1944 Bologna. World-weary Comandante De Luca is tasked with investigating three brutal murders – with the lives of ten Italian hostages on the line. ‘A stripped-down historical thriller loaded with tension’ La Repubblica ______ In November 1944, in the worst winter ever known in Bologna, less than a year since the founding of the Republic of Salò, the bomb-scarred streets are filled with starving refugees who have fled the advancing Allies. The Fascist Black Brigades, the officers of the S.S. and the partisans of the Italian Resistance compete for control in bloody warfare. Comandante De Luca, once “the most brilliant investigative officer in Bologna” and now working for the Political Police in a building that doubles as a torture facility, finds himself in over his head when three murders land on his desk: a professor shot through the eye, an engineer beaten to death, and a German corporal left to be gnawed on by rats in a flooded cellar. Losing sleep and his peace of mind, De Luca must close all three cases with ten lives on the line: the Italian hostages who will face a Nazi firing squad if the corporal’s killing is not solved to their satisfaction. As he threads his way through a web of personal and political motivations, risking his life with every step, De Luca will uncover to his own cost the secrets awaiting him in the frozen heart of Bologna. _____ ‘The Darkest Winter paints the portrait of a city devastated by war, scarred by bombs and with its poorest inhabitants living in desperation. The result is a living fresco, a snapshot of an era. The quality of Lucarelli’s research, in-depth analysis and narrative style put him in a league of his own’ Corriere della Serra ‘Lucarelli has proven yet again that he is an extraordinary writer, navigating with ease the murky waters between crime fiction, historical novel and social commentary’ La Nuova ‘Lucarelli’s best work’ La Lettura Praise for Carlo Lucarelli’s previous books in English translation ‘A fresh and exciting new voice in Italian crime fiction’ Booklist ‘A stunning tour de force’ Sunday Telegraph ‘A compact and powerful masterpiece’ Guardian

Camilleri, best known for his Inspector Montalbano series, presents the charming Judge Surra who moves to a small Sicilian town in the late nineteenth century. He does not quite understand the quirky welcoming gifts from the locals, but nothing stands in the way of his quest for justice - and pastries. Lucarelli brings us a far darker story. Judge Valentina Lorenzi - La Bambina - is so young and inexperienced she hardly merits a bodyguard. But when she barely survives an assassin's bullet, her black-and-white world of crime and punishment turns a deathly shade of grey. In The Triple Dream of the Prosecutor, De Cataldo, a judge himself, crafts a Kafkaesque tale of a lifelong feud between Prosecutor Mandati and the corrupt Mayor of Novere. When the mayor narrowly escapes a series of bizarre assassination attempts, Mandati begins to realise that all his dreams may just be coming true. From Italy's premiere crime authors, three novellas from every tradition of crime writing.

In Roberto Saviano's The Opposite of Death, a town in southern Italy is haunted by the war in Afghanistan, where one by one its sons are dying. In Ferengi, Carlo Lucarelli explores the Italian settlement of Eritrea a century ago, when the actions of a maid became pivotal to the fate of an exploitative colonial family. Valeria Parrella's The Prize, set in the Italian countryside during the Second World War, reminds us that revenge is a dish best served cold, while Piero Colaprico's Stairway C is a breathless Milanese crime novel in miniature. Grassroots writers' collective Wu Ming show how an Italian cheese-maker can become a hero in American Parmesan, and in Another Kind of Solitude, Simona Vinci suggests that it is only when we are on the outside, or alone, that we find true freedom.

Only the picture of a pit bull terrier left behind at each murder can link the crimes. Day after day, Ispettore Negro works on her seemingly impossible case. But when a young man unwittingly encounters Pit Bull in an internet chat room, he provides Negro with the clue that could lead her to her target.

A serial killer is terrorising the people of Bologna and rookie Detective Inspector Grazia Negro is determined to solve the case.