For over half a century the beautiful Temple of Apollo has been in the care of the old beekeeper Gabrilis. But when the value of the land soars he is forced to sign away his interests – and hours later he meets a violent, lonely death. When Hermes Diaktoros finds his friend’s battered body by a dusty roadside, the police quickly make him the prime suspect. But with rapacious developers threatening Arcadia’s most ancient sites, there are many who stand to gain from Gabrilis’s death. Hermes resolves to avenge his old friend and find the true culprit, but his investigative methods are, as ever, unorthodox …
*
‘More transported Agatha Christie here ... Hermes is a delight. Half Poirot, half deus ex machina, but far more earth-bound than his first name suggests ... A cracking plot, colourful local characters and descriptions of the hot, dry countryside so strong that you can almost see the heat haze and hear the cicadas – the perfect read to curl up with’
GUARDIAN
THE DOCTOR OF THESSALY
A jilted bride weeps on an empty beach, a local doctor is attacked in an isolated churchyard – trouble has come at a bad time to Morfi, just as the backwater village is making headlines with a visit from a government minister. Fortunately, where there’s trouble there’s Hermes Diaktoros, the mysterious fat man whose tennis shoes are always pristine and whose methods are always unorthodox. Hermes must solve a brutal crime, thwart the petty machinations of the town’s ex-mayor and pour oil on the troubled waters of a sisters’ relationship – but how can he solve a mystery that not even the victim wants to be solved?
*
‘If you don’t find yourself in Greece this summer, then Zouroudi’s latest mystery brings the Hellenic vibe tantalisingly close … Once again Hermes Diaktoros – a reassuringly earthbound investigator – finds himself dealing with a chorus of colourful locals’
INDEPENDENT
THE LADY OF SORROWS
A painter is found dead at sea off the coast of a remote Greek island. For our enigmatic detective Hermes Diaktoros, the plot can only thicken: the painter’s work, an icon of the Virgin long famed for its miraculous powers, has just been uncovered as a fake. But has the painter died of natural causes or by a wrathful hand? What secret is a dishonest gypsy keeping? And what haunts the ancient catacombs beneath the bishop’s house?
*
‘Anne Zouroudi writes beautifully – her books have all the sparkle and light of the island landscapes in which she sets them. The Lady of Sorrows, her latest, is a gorgeous treat’
ALEXANDER MCCALL SMITH
THE BULL OF MITHROS
It is summer, and as tourists, drawn by the legend of a priceless missing artifact, disembark on the sun-drenched quay of Mithros, the languid calm of the island is broken by the unorthodox arrival of a stranger who has been thrown overboard in the bay. Lacking money or identification, he is forced for a while to remain on Mithros. But is he truly a stranger? To some, his face seems familiar.
The arrival of the investigator Hermes Diaktoros, intrigued himself by the island's fabled bull, coincides with a violent and mysterious death. This violence has an echo in Mithros's recent past: in a brutal unsolved crime committed several years before, which, although apparently forgotten may not yet have been forgiven.
As Hermes sets about solving the complex puzzle of who is guilty and who is innocent, he discovers a web of secrets and unspoken loyalties, and it soon becomes clear that the bull of Mithros may only be the least of the island's shadowy mysteries.
www.bloomsbury.com/annezouroudi
First published in Great Britain 2011
Copyright © Anne Zouroudi 2011
Map © John Gilkes 2011
This electronic edition published 2011 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
The right of Anne Zouroudi to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted
by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise
make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means
(including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying,
printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable
to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Bloomsbury Publishing London New York Berlin Sydney
50 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DP
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 4088 1818 3
www.bloomsbury.com/annezouroudi
Visit www.bloomsbury.com to find out more about our authors and their books.
You will find extracts, authors interviews, author events and you can sign up for
newsletters to be the first to hear about our latest releases and special offers.
The Whispers of Nemesis Page 26