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Book Summary and Reviews of A Small Death in Lisbon by Robert Wilson

A Small Death in Lisbon by Robert Wilson

A Small Death in Lisbon

by Robert Wilson

  • Readers' Rating (2):
  • Published:
  • Oct 2000, 448 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

Nazi wartime deals and the modern-day murder of a Portuguese teen are linked with originality and suspense in this award–winning crime novel.

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.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"Gripping and beautifully written mystery." ―Publishers Weekly

"An engrossing and complex tale...immensely satisfying mastery of craft and language." ―Library Journal

This information about A Small Death in Lisbon was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

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Author Information

Robert Wilson

Robert Wilson was born in 1957. A graduate of Oxford University, he has worked in shipping, advertising, and trading in Africa. He has traveled in Asia and Africa and has lived in Greece and West Africa. He is married and writes from an isolated farmhouse in Portugal.

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