€œYou either love Andrea Camilleri or you haven€t read him yet. Each novel in this wholly addictive, entirely magical series, set in Sicily and starring a detective unlike any other in crime fiction, blasts the brain like a shot of pure oxygen. Aglow with local color, packed with flint-dry wit, as fresh and clean as Mediterranean seafood €" altogether transporting. Long live Camilleri, and long live Montalbano.€ A.J. Finn, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Woman in the Window
A hail of bullets interrupts a period of dead calm. An elderly brother and sister open fire on the plaza below their apartment, punishing the people of Vig ta for their sins. News cameras capture Montalbano€"gun in hand€"as he scales the building to capture the ancient snipers. Inside he finds a nightmarish world of religious objects and a well-worn inflatable sex doll that will come back to haunt him. The Inspector is hailed as a hero after the televised adventure and calm returns. But Montalbano begins to receive cryptic messages in verse, challenging him to go on a "treasure hunt." Intrigued, he accepts, treating the messages as amusing riddles€"until they take a dangerous turn.