The terracotta dog - Andrea Camilleri

THE TERRACOTTA DOG opens with a mysterious tete-a-tete with a mafioso, some inexplicably abandoned loot from a supermarket heist, and some dying words that lead Inspector Montalbano to a secret grotto in a mountain cave where two young lovers, dead fifty years and still embracing, are watched over by a life-size terracotta dog.

Montalbano's passion to solve this old crime takes him, heedless of personal danger, on a journey through the island's past and into a family's dark heart amid the horrors of World War II.

With sly wit and a keen understanding of human nature, Montalbano is a detective whose earthiness, compassion and intelligence make him totally irresistible.