The author has great writing style and writes with a quiet confidence. There is an immaculate sense of place as the plot unfolds under the scorching heat of the Spanish sun and the author combines a gangster thriller with the suspense of a man looking for his missing wife. This is also a story about cracking a mysterious code which is dealt with in an intricate and fascinating way. A truly gripping read.

David Bowman Reid writes with a quiet confidence. There is an immaculate sense of place as the plot unfolds under the scorching heat of the Spanish sun and the author combines the steely edge of a gangster thriller with the suspense of a man looking for his missing wife. This is also a story about cracking a mysterious code which is dealt with in an intricate and fascinating way. A gripping, intelligent read.

Sam Crawford, a recently retired maths lecturer, is on his way with his sister Helen to Granada. He has been booked to give a talk to students at the university on “Pattern Recognition as an Aid to Code Breaking.”

It had been three years since Sam’s wife Carol’s mysterious disappearance while they were on holiday in Florence. Sam needed to relax but he had not anticipated being drawn in to help in a murder investigation involving the shady character, Hernandez.

Nor had he appreciated the part that the innocent Spanish statuette he had bought his wife would play in the events that were to unfold.
An enjoyable read

A disappointing novel that never managed to engage me. Set in Southern Spain, it involves an meek English professor on vacations, some criminal activities, murder and codebreaking.
But unfortunately the plot is a mess, meandering and too often ending up in some tedious fictional "culs-de-sac" as if the author had two story lines at the beginning and he never really managed to decide which one to follow. Characters appear then disappear and never come back and some ridiculous elements in the plot are never properly explained. I tried but I wouldn't be able to really recommend it.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Matador for allowing me to obtain this ARC

Thus book was a very interesting read!
The premise of this book really intrigued me.
I really enjoyed the writing, it flowed nicely. And the events that unfolded was crazy surprising.
I enjoyed the characters, Sam was such a realistic character.
The story itself was great, very interesting. I was actually hooked from the first page. The mystery, suspense. It was amazing.

Thank you NetGalley, Publisher and Author for the chance to read and review this ebook!