“We need a policeman,” someone suggested.

“A detective.” “We have one,” Foxa said. Everyone followed the direction of his gaze. “This is ridiculous,” I protested. “Are you crazy?” “You were Sherlock Holmes.” “Nobody was Sherlock Holmes. That detective never existed. He is a literary invention.” “Which you embodied wonderfully.” “That was in the cinema. It had nothing to do with real life.”

June 1960. A storm keeps nine guests of a small local hotel isolated on the idyllic Microisland, opposite Corfu. Nothing foreshadows what is about to happen: Edith Manders, a discreet English tourist, is found dead at the beach kiosk. What looks like a suicide hides suspicious clues, visible only to Hopalong Basil, a once famous actor who once portrayed on screen the most famous detective of all time.

Used to applying Sherlock Holmes' deductive abilities in cinema, he is the only one who can unravel what this classic closed-room mystery truly hides. On an island from which no one can leave and no one can arrive, inevitably everyone will end up suspected in an exciting puzzle novel where detective literature impressively blends with life.

“Peréz-Reverte crafts his novels like an old Spanish bartender, refined and elegant, who sometimes got drunk in the company of Corto Maltese.”