White King – 9781529093841

As agile as a matador, Gómez-Jurado skilfully balances exhilarating thrills with the melancholy that is the price of Antonia’s gifts’ – The Times”I hope you haven’t forgotten me. Shall we play?”Antonia Scott has an unusually gifted forensic mind. She’s the lynchpin of a top-secret project, Red Queen, created to work across borders to solve the most devious and dangerous crimes, those that are beyond the skills of the regular police. But the Red Queen project is under attack on all fronts. Across Europe, its agents are murdering each other, and long-resolved cases from the past are rearing their deadly heads again. At the centre of it all is the mysterious and dangerous Mr White. Jon Gutiérrez, Antonia’s protector and the only person she trusts, has been kidnapped. With Jon’s life at stake, Mr White gives Antonia a seemingly innocuous challenge: solve three crimes and bring the perpetrators to justice. The only way to keep Jon alive is to play Mr White’s game, but can Antonia win when she can only see part of the board?The thrilling conclusion to Juan Gómez-Jurado’s internationally bestselling Antonia Scott trilogy. Translated by Nick Caistor and Lorenza Garcia. Praise for Juan Gómez-Jurado:’Fizzes with energy and lively scene-setting . . . There are obvious echoes of Lisbeth Salander, but the crackling interplay between Scott and Inspector Gutiérrez, a gay Basque policeman, adds an extra layer of originality, as does Nick Caistor’s sparkling translation’ – Financial Times’What Gómez-Jurado excels at, as conveyed in Nick Caistor’s brisk translation, is pacing of the breakneck variety. Short chapters, funny asides, lethally potent descriptions: they all contribute to a frenetic page-turning momentum . . . you’ll have great fun reading it’ – The New York Times