Andrea Camilleri

Stumbling on a fifty-year-old mystery involving a pair of lovers whose bodies are found in a mountain cave beside a dog statue, Inspector Salvo Montalbano investigates the island's past and traces a family's secret back to World War II. Reprint.

The Terra-cotta Dog

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.

The Terracotta Dog

Andrew Sztehlo

I really liked Shape of Water but the Terracotta Dog took the Montalbano mysteries to another level. The sights, sounds, smells, and tastes of coastal Sicily are richer, the humour sharper, the character development and the relationships deeper, and on top of it an epic central mystery 50 years in the making, going back to the very foundations of historic Sicily. Just wonderful from beginning to end. Camilleri’s characters are compassionate and soulful and it is an absolute pleasure to return to the world of Montalbano. Looking forward to reading the rest of the series. Montalbano is shaping up to be my favourite literary detective.

The Terra-cotta Dog

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