Synopses & Reviews
“Energetic, thoughtful first in a new series . . . Fans of intelligent thrillers will eagerly await the next installment." --
Publishers Weekly, starred review
Alyshia D’Cruz, daughter of Indian tycoon Frank D’Cruz, has grown up in London and Mumbai wanting for nothing. After a boozy evening out, she gets in the wrong cab home.
Enter Charles Boxer. Ex-army, ex-police, he has found his niche in private security. His specialty: kidnap and recovery. When D’Cruz hires Boxer to find Alyshia, Boxer knows Frank’s crooked business empire has made him plenty of enemies. Despite the vast D’Cruz fortune, the kidnappers don’t want cash, instead favoring a cruel and lethal game. But the British government doesn’t want its big new investor to lose his daughter in the heart of the capital. The MI6 office in India follows Boxer’s lead, and soon it seems more lives than Alyshia’s are at stake as the trail crosses paths with a terrorist plot on British soil.
To save Alyshia, Boxer must dodge religious fanatics, Indian mobsters, and London’s homegrown crime lords. Capital Punishment is a thrilling journey to the dark side of people and places that lie just out of view, waiting for the moment to tear a life apart.
Review
PRAISE FOR THE BIG KILLING
"A narrative distilled from pure protein: potent, fiercely imagined and not a little frightening."-Literary Review (UK)
PRAISE FOR INSTRUMENTS OF DARKNESS
"A witty, fast-moving, and picaresque tale . . . peopled by
deliciously shady characters."-Nelson DeMille
Review
PRAISE FOR THE BLIND MAN OF SEVILLE
"Splendid ... Wilson has a talent for digging beneath the skin to explore psychological and emotional nuances." --New York Daily News
"This splendid . . . novel from Robert Wilson is consistently stunning, intriguing, and arresting."- St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Review
PRAISE FOR
THE HIDDEN ASSASSINS"[Wilson] has written a challenging, engaging novel about the terror of religious zealotry, both the Muslim and Christian varieties . . . The Hidden Assassins is a complicated, disturbing novel for complicated, disturbing times."USA Today "The third Falcón thriller once again demonstrates that few writersin any genrecan match Wilson's depth of character and plot or his evocation of place and of history."The Boston Globe
Review
PRAISE FOR
INSTRUMENTS OF DARKNESS"A witty, fast-moving and picaresque tale . . . peopled by deliciously shady characters."--Nelson DeMille
"An atmospheric and absorbing debut ... Vividly paints a credible picture of a world I know almost nothing about. Now I feel I've been there." --Val McDermid
PRAISE FOR THE COMPANY OF STRANGERS:
"An espionage thriller of the first order--complex, exotic, romantic."--San Francisco Chronicle
PRAISE FOR A SMALL DEATH IN LISBON:
"A taut international thriller."--Time
Review
PRAISE FOR
THE VANISHED HANDS"Tangly, sprawly, garrulous, astute, here's one more Wilson witchery that intertwines literature and art."--Los Angeles Times
"A Chandleresque mystery to be savored."--The News-Press (Fort Myers, FL)
Review
Alyshia DCruz, the privileged daughter of an Indian billionaire of Portuguese extraction, has grown up in Londons high society. After an unhappy stint in Mumbai to learn about her fathers international enterprises, she returns to London and finds a job on her own. Following a goodbye party for a coworker, a very drunk Alyshia leaves in what turns out to be decidedly the wrong cab. Her father, Francisco "Frank" Cruz, hires Charles Boxer, a homicide detective-turned-"kidnapping consultant" whom Frank somehow knows is sometimes willing to cross the line and erase perpetrators for an additional fee. Complicating matters is that the kidnappers will only deal with Alyshias mother, Isabel Marks, who is divorced from Frank. Furthermore, the kidnappers seem not to want the money that Frank is readily able to pay but instead demand "a demonstration of sincerity." Verdict British suspense author Wilson (A Small Death in Lisbon; The Company of Strangers) launches an exciting new series with this smart, sophisticated, and twisty thriller that keeps the reader guessing to the final page. Fans of Wilsons other thrillers will definitely enjoy this one.—
Library Journal, STARRED review Set in London, this energetic, thoughtful first in a new series from Gold Dagger Award-winner Wilson (A Small Death in Lisbon) introduces Charles Boxer, a former cop turned private security professional specializing in kidnapping. When 25-year-old Alyshia DCruz, the daughter of a self-made Indian billionaire, is kidnapped after an evening out with her co-workers, Boxer is charged with getting Alyshia back alive. The kidnapper, who insists that the crime "is not about money," urges the family not to involve the press or the police. That a lot more than money, or Alyshias safety, is at stake becomes clear as the plot slowly, impressively expands to include an enormous cast of characters and a broad array of themes—global finance, the inequality of wealth, Islamic fundamentalism, counterterrorism. While at times
the storys immensity threatens to overwhelm the appealing Boxer, who is supremely competent yet reassuringly flawed,
fans of intelligent thrillers will eagerly await the next installment.--
Publishers Weekly, STARRED review In the first installment of a new series by Wilson (A Small Death in Lisbon, 2000, etc.), the estranged daughter of an Indian tycoon is abducted in London for reasons that don't seem to involve ransom money—and then re-abducted.
Sussing out this odd turn of events, "kidnapping and recovery" expert Charles Boxer is drawn into an international plot that may involve terrorists. Part spy novel, part police procedural and part terrorist thriller, this book features a wide assortment of suspects and victims. The tycoon, Frank D'Cruz, is a former Bollywood star whose coldblooded business methods have made countless enemies—but whose investments have made him a favored guest of the U.K. His 25-year-old daughter, Alyshia—whose mother, Isabel, is British—had mysterious dealings of her own during her times in Mumbai that may have contributed to her kidnapping. Boxer, a former military man and cop trying to live down his reputation for killing as well as thwarting kidnappers, complicates the investigation by having an affair with Isabel while collaborating with his West African ex-wife, Mercy, who's with the Metropolitan Police. The perpetually unraveling plot involves members of the Indian underworld looking for payback, London lowlifes looking for a fast score and Islamic extremists looking to blow up London. And while all this is going on, the estranged daughter of Boxer and Mercy is demanding attention. As packed with characters and incident as the book is, Wilson remains in elegant control of the narrative. Though there are times when the book bogs down a bit in the details, it never loses its grip.One of the more sophisticated writers in his field, Wilson leaves us looking forward to Charles Boxer's next assignment.--Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Crackerjack . . . Featuring a large cast of well-sketched players and a plethora of plot twists,
Capital Punishment shifts scenes briskly from London to Lisbon, Mumbai to Lahore. Wilson writes with elegant vigor as he describes the shoot-outs and emotional crescendos that result from the political and criminal intrigue at the heart of the book." --
Wall Street Journal "When it comes to turning over rocks, whether in London or Spain or South Africa or South Asia, Wilson knows how to show us the dark creatures that lurk beneath. . . . I don't think it will spoil any of the plot to say that just when you think the situation may be settling down, the kidnap leads us to the discovery of how a sleeper cell of al Qaeda terrorists put all of London in danger. By then you will be reading for your life." -- Alan Cheuse,
San Francisco Chronicle "A gripping new thriller. Charles Boxer, ex-cop and soldier, is a private operative specializing in resolving kidnappings. . . . Wilson keeps tight control of his material." --
Seattle Times "Suspense author Wilson launches an exciting new series with this smart, sophisticated, and twisty thriller that keeps the reader guessing to the final page. Fans of Wilsons other thrillers will definitely enjoy this one." —
Library Journal, STARRED review "Set in London, this energetic, thoughtful first in a new series from Gold Dagger Award-winner Wilson introduces Charles Boxer. . . .Fans of intelligent thrillers will eagerly await the next installment." --
Publishers Weekly, STARRED review "One of the more sophisticated writers in his field." --
Kirkus Reviews
Review
PRAISE FOR THE VANISHED HANDS "Tangly, sprawly, garrulous, astute, here's one more Wilson witchery."--Los Angeles Times "Wilson builds a many-layered portrait of survivors and perpetrators, each consumed by rage, guilt, or depression." -- The Boston Globe
Review
Praise for THE HIDDEN ASSASSINS
"The Hidden Assassins, the third Falcón thriller, once again demonstrates that few writersin any genrecan match Wilson's depth of character and plot or his evocation of place and of history."Boston Globe
"Modern terrorism is uppermost in the minds of those who populate Robert Wilsons new novel, but the engines driving The Hidden Assassins through to its satisfying, nuanced finish are old human emotions: greed, obsession, love."Washington Post Book World
"A complicated, disturbing novel for complicated, disturbing times."USA Today
Review
The accidental death of a Russian gangster sets demons of all sorts loose in this final installment in Wilsons Seville tetralogy. Only his death in a freak traffic accident has short-circuited Vasili Lukyanovs plan to shift his allegiance from Mafia boss Leonid Revnik to Afghan War veteran Yuri Donstov, whose heroin-smuggling scheme spells big rubles for everyone. The routine accident seems unconnected to Inspector Jefe Javier Falcóns ongoing investigation into the bombing of an apartment house (
The Hidden Assassins, 2006, etc.), or his crusade to get to the bottom of his ex-wifes murder, allegedly by her husband, disgraced judge Esteban Calderón. Yet whenever he presses Calderóns girlfriend Marisa Moreno, the chief witness against the defiant judge, for details, hes warned by an anonymous caller to mind his own business. Eventually the threats escalate to a more baleful kind of pressure: the abduction of his on-again lover Consuelo Jiménezs eight-year-old son Darío. What could be worse than having to deal with kidnappers ready to kill the boy? Being caught between two sets of criminals, equally determined to bend Falcón to their will, both claiming to have Darío. Its no wonder that Falcóns hard-pressed to help his best friend Yacoub Diouri, an undercover agent whos infiltrated a group of Moroccan terrorists only to find that theyve enlisted Yacoubs son Abdullah as a suicide bomber.Half a dozen other meaty, painstakingly interlinked subplots make this climactic volume as close-knit as a prose poem on counterterrorism. For fans of international intrigue, however, this capstone is the mother lode.
Review
Summer in Seville and Inspector Jefe Javier Falcn is called out in the middle of the night to the scene of a spectacular car crash. The victim, a high-ranking member of the Russian mob, is carrying close to 8 million euros and computer discs depicting numerous top-level officials in compromising positions. Desperate to keep his promise to Sevilles citizens to bring the perpetrators of a terrorist bombing to justice, Falcn is convinced he now possesses evidence of the Russian mobs involvement in the plot to subvert the Andalusian parliament.
His investigations carry him into the midst of a mob turf warand he soon discovers the mob plays by their own rules. Pressure is applied to those nearest to him in an attempt to distract him from his investigations. His best friend Yacoub, a spy for the Spanish government, reveals that he is being blackmailed by Islamist extremists, and Consuela, Falcns lover, suffers a mothers worst nightmare. Will he have to pay an unthinkable price if he wants to discover the truth?
With The Ignorance of Blood, Robert Wilson brings his Inspector Jefe Javier Falcn series to a close. The series, begun with_ Blind Man of Seville,_ is both police procedural and psychological thriller, psychological because it delves into the purpose and identity of its hero. Each volume can be read alone; however, taken as a series Wilsons overarching themes of appearance, reality and family come strongly into focus. While Falcn is clearly the hero of the series, Seville is its heart. Wilsons extensive research and love of the city is evident from the first word.
The Ignorance of Blood explores idealism and values, and before the end each of its main characters are pushed to their limits and forced to face their inner truths, often at great cost. Wilson has created a stunning finale; however, the pages are periodically painted with blood and human misery. While this is a stunning work and definitely a worthwhile read, those extremely sensitive to violence against children may wish to consider carefully before beginning.
Armchair Interviews says: Another fine offering from this very prolific and Gold Dagger award-winning mystery, crime, thriller, suspense writer.
Review
PRAISE FOR
A SMALL DEATH IN LISBON“Turns a local murder case into a taut international thriller . . . with considerable, nail-biting skill.”--Time
"A suspenseful, intricately plotted, violent and steamy tale. You will turn the last page of this compelling novel out of breath." --The New York Times
"Wilson has flushed out history with complex characters and a captivating story."--San Francisco Examiner and Chronicle
PRAISE FOR THE COMPANY OF STRANGERS
"Absorbing and brilliantly written, [The Company of Strangers] is caviar for the cognoscenti. And for the general reader too."--Los Angeles Times
"Wilson's thriller is complex, chilling, and cleverly written as he dissects the murky world of espionage, where the players are maneuvered by their ruthless masters like pawns on a chessboard." --Chicago Tribune
Review
"A deft handling of converging timescales and an exploration of fundamental human relationships.-Golden Dagger citation from England's Crime Writers Association
"Robert Wilson is a masterful craftsman, and with this atmospheric page-turner, he should find the wide readership he amply deserves."-Manchester Evening News
"Highly satisfying, part thriller, part psychological mystery and part novel of ideas. And superbly well written."-The Irish Times
Review
PRAISE FOR THE COMPANY OF STRANGERS "[The Company of Strangers] is streets ahead of most other thrillers."-The Times (London)
"A plotter's delight . . . [Wilson] creates an intriguing moral maze for his heroine to negotiate."-The Guardian (London)
PRAISE FOR A SMALL DEATH IN LISBON
Winner of the Gold Dagger Award for Best Crime Novel
"Robert Wilson's A Small Death in Lisbon turns a local murder case into a taut international thriller . . . with considerable, nailbaiting skill."-Time
"A tour de force."-Los Angeles Times
"Historically sprawling, richly distilled thriller . . . The whole is a suspenseful, intricately plotted, violent and steamy tale. You will turn the last page of this compelling novel out of breath."-The New York Times
Review
PRAISE FOR BLOOD IS DIRT
"Robert Wilson is a class act. . . . For once, a novelist influenced by
Raymond Chandler is not shown up by the comparison."
—THE SUNDAY TIMES (LONDON)
“A vivid and steamy stumble on the wild side.”
—VAL McDERMID, a u t h o r o f THE DISTANT ECHO
Review
"An engrossing read. Gulp it down."
Review
"Tough-talking, hard-hitting characters."
Review
"Wilson is a class act. For once, a novelist influenced by Raymond Chandler is not shown up by the comparison."
Review
"An excellent thriller ... A vivid and steamy stumble on the wild side."
Review
PRAISE FOR A DARKENING STAIN
“Robert Wilson dissects the dark heart of Africa with an insight and
compassion that makes it so sleazily vivid youd pay money not to go
there.”—VAL McDERMID, a u t h o r o f THE DISTANT ECHO
"Tightly plotted and tautly written ... Perfectly attuned to the violent
wavelength of this unpredictable world."
—THE SUNDAY TIMES (LONDON)
Review
"Exhilarating ... Unmissable ... Unflinchingly imagined and executed. No hint of competition."
Review
"Tightly plotted and tautly written ... Perfectly attuned to the violent wavelength of this unpredictable world."
Review
"Robert Wilson dissects the dark heart of Africa with an insight and compassion ... Vivid."
Synopsis
As a sweltering Seville recovers from the shock of a terrorist attack, Inspector Jefe Javier Falcón is struggling to find the bombers. The death of a gangster in a spectacular car crash offers vital evidence implicating the Russian mafia in his investigation, but it pitches Falcón into the heart of a turf war over prostitution and drugs. Now the target of vicious hoods, Falcón finds those closest to him are also coming under intolerable pressure: his best friend, whos spying for the Spanish government, reveals that he is being blackmailed by Islamist extremists, and Falcóns own lover suffers a mothers worst nightmare. He might be able to bring the perpetrators of the bombing to justice, but there will be a devastating price to pay.
Synopsis
In this second novel of the Bruce Medway series, our hero, a go-between and "fixer" for traders in steamy West Africa, smells trouble when a porn merchant asks him to deliver a video at a secret location. Things look up, though, when he's hired to act as minder to Ron Collins, a spoiled playboy looking for diamonds in the Ivory Coast. Medway thinks this could be the answer to his cashflow crisis. But when the video delivery leads to a shootout and the discovery of a mutilated body, he wants out. Obligations keep Medway fixed in the Ivory Coast and he is soon caught up in a terrifying cycle of violence. Unless he can get to the bottom of the mystery, Medway knows that for the savage killer out there in the African night, he is the next target.
Synopsis
Called to a gruesome crime scene, Inspector Javier Falcón is shocked and sickened by what he finds. Littered like flower petals on the victim's shirt are the man's own eyelids, evidence of a heinous crime with no obvious motive. When the investigation leads him to read his late father's journals, he discovers a disturbing and sordid past. Meanwhile, more victims are falling. While Falcón struggles to solve the case, he finds the missing section of his father's journal-and becomes the murderer's next intended victim.
Combining suspenseful storytelling with a thoughtful exploration of the human psyche, The Blind Man of Seville confirms bestselling and award-winning author Robert Wilson as one of the greatest literary mystery writers working today.
Synopsis
As Inspector Jefe Javier Falcón investigates a faceless, mutilated corpse, the beautiful city of Seville is rocked by a massive explosion. The discovery of a mosque in the basement of a devastated apartment building confirms everybodys terrorist fears. Panic sweeps the city and the region goes on red alert. As more bodies are dragged from the rubble, the media interest and political pressure intensify and Falcón suspects that all is not what it appears to be. Just as he comes close to cracking the conspiracy, he makes the most terrifying discovery of all and the race is on to prevent a catastrophe far beyond Spains borders. A masterful thriller, The Hidden Assassins is fiction of the highest order.
Synopsis
From the author of the national bestseller
A Small Death in Lisbon and
The Company of Strangers comes Wilson's compelling first novel, never before available in the United States. Bruce Medway's existence as a fixer and troubleshooter had been tough, but never life-threatening until he crossed paths with the mighty Madame Severnou. His life becomes even more complicated by his search for a missing fellow expat, Steven Kershaw. Against a backdrop of political disruption and endemic official corruption, Medway pursues the elusive phantom of Kershaw.
Instruments of Darkness powerfully evokes the atmosphere, politics, and people of West Africa. With Medway's ironic voice, flashes of humor that may recall Raymond Chandler, and unforgettable characters, this compulsively readable thriller is the beginning of a remarkable series.
Synopsis
A suspicious suicide calls Javier Falcón to a wealthy neighborhood on the outskirts of Seville in this sensational follow-up to Robert Wilson's thriller The Blind Man of Seville. Falcón begins to investigate a case with no solid evidence when suddenly, in quick succession, two more suicides occur-one of them a fellow police officer in the sex crimes unit. Left to discover what made life so unbearable for these victims, Falcón must find the connection among the suicides. As his investigation deepens, so too does suspicion that perhaps these deaths aren't suicides after all, and the mystery takes a shocking, explosive turn.
Synopsis
In a locked room, a kidnapped girl shivers: Meet London's dark side in this thrilling new book from an acclaimed suspense writer.
Synopsis
Robert Wilson is back with the follow-up to his sensational thriller, The Blind Man of Seville. Javier Falcón has been through therapy and is in the process of breaking free of the psychological damage sustained during his last major investigation. Called to the scene of a suspicious suicide in a wealthy neighborhood on the outskirts of Seville, he begins to investigate a case with no solid evidence when suddenly, in quick succession, two more suicides occur-one of them a fellow police officer in the sex crimes unit. Left to discover what made life so unbearable for these victims, Falcón's task is to find the connection among the suicides. Or were they, in fact, murdered?
Synopsis
Detective Inspector Javier Falcón is transfixed by the brutalized face of murder victim Raul Jiménez in his Seville apartment. On his shirtfront, littered like exotic petals, are the man's eyelids, and so the victims relentless horror becomes the beginning of Falcón's own.
An old photograph at the murder scene prompts Falcón to read a set of journals left by his famous father, the artist Fransisco Falcón. He discovers that he'd never known the father he'd always loved, and as the case unfolds, Falcón's mind unravels as all the old certainties are undermined. More victims fall but neither the evidence nor the secrets of the victims' lives give Falcón the vital breakthrough he needs. The pieces of the puzzle finally fall together when Falcón finds the missing section of his father's journals--and becomes the killer's next intended victim.
With The Blind Man of Seville, Robert Wilson's unparalleled combination
of suspenseful storytelling and keen understanding of the ambiguities of the human soul confirm his place as one of the best mystery writers in the world today.
Synopsis
1941. Klaus Felsen, forced out of his Berlin factory into the SS, arrives in a luminous Lisbon, where Nazis and Allies, refugees and entrepreneurs, dance to the strains of opportunism and despair. Felsen's assignment takes him to the bleak mountains of the north where a devious and brutal battle is being fought for an element vital to Hitler's bliztkrieg. There he meets the man who plants the first seed of greed and revenge that will grow into a thick vine in the landscape of post-war Portugal. Late 1990s. Investigating the murder of a young girl with a disturbing sexual past, Inspector Ze Coelho overturns the dark soil of history and unearths old bones from Portugal's fascist past. This small death in Lisbon is horrific compensation for an even older crime, and Coelho's stubborn pursuit of its truth reveals a tragedy that unites past and present. Robert Wilson's combination of intelligence, suspense, vivid characters, and mesmerizing storytelling richly deserves the international acclaim his novel has received.
Synopsis
The award-winning author of A Small Death in Lisbon brings an exciting richness to the long shadow of evil in this crackling new novel of spycraft and international intrigue.
Lisbon, 1944:
Andrea Aspinall, plucked out of academia by British intelligence so that her mathematical knowledge might help in the hunt for atomic secrets, disappears under a new identity in Lisbon, where such secrets are easily bought and sold.
Karl Voss, already experienced in the illusions of intrigue when he arrives in Lisbon, is an attache at the German Legation, though he is secretly working against the Nazis to rescue Germany from annihilation.
After a night of terrible violence, Andrea creates a family for herself from Voss's memory and the clandestine world they knew. In Portugal, in England, and in the chilly world of Cold War Berlin, she discovers that the deepest secrets aren't held by governments-and that death is a relative term. In The Company of Strangers, Robert Wilson takes the chilling irony of "secret intelligence" to a new and more poignant human level, as he shows that the heart is both more knowing and more secretive than the mind.
Synopsis
Enter into a treacherous world in West Africa, where British expatriate Bruce Medway, a clandestine “troubleshooter” and debt collector, finds himself unexpectedly immersed in toxic waste scams and mafia crime when a job for his newest client turns out to involve more than the recovery of two million dollars. But Napier, the client, isnt the worst of Bruces problems; that falls to Selina, Napiers seductive daughter, who wants more than money—she is out for revenge. In his attempt to help Selina, Bruce delves into more danger than he bargained for.
Nothing is static in this intense plot-driven novel where truth is murky and motives are hidden.While Bruce is no stranger to lies, deceit, and crime, he has never met anyone like Selina and her cohorts. And even though Selina is alluring, not even love can change the fact that in this world, blood is dirt.
A Harvest Original
Synopsis
When schoolgirls begin to disappear on the West African coast, "troubleshooter" Bruce Medway tries to remain detached. Meanwhile, he reluctantly acquires a new job from former nemesis and mafia capo Franconelli. Franconelli gives Bruce forty-eight hours to find a French trader, Mariner, whom not even the mafia has been able to track. Yet as Bruce sets out on his assignment, he is unable to remain disconnected from the mysterious schoolgirl disappearances, and finds that girls, gold, and greed are all interconnected; corruption abounds everywhere. There are no safe havens for Bruce in this situation, and he must devise a scam that risks everything in order to stay alive.
A brilliant follow-up to Blood is Dirt, and the fourth novel in the Bruce Medway series, A Darkening Stain takes Bruce Medway into the darkest territory of West Africa yet.
A Harvest Original
About the Author
ROBERT WILSON is the author of numerous novels, including The Company of Strangers and A Small Death in Lisbon, which won the Gold Dagger Award as Best Crime Novel of the Year from Britains Crime Writers Association. A graduate of Oxford University, he has worked in shipping, advertising, and trading in Africa, and has lived in Greece, Portugal, and West Africa.