When a man is found stabbed to death floating in the canal, Commissario Brunetti is convinced he recognises him from somewhere. But with no identification on the body and no reports of people missing from the Venice area, it seems as if he has appeared from nowhere, and the case is at a dead end. It doesn't take long for Brunetti to realise why he remembers the dead man - he saw him at a demonstration a couple of years ago, where farmers were protesting about European milk quotas. But what was his involvement with the protest, and could it have anything to do with his murder? Having nothing to go on but the distinctive shoes the man was wearing, and a disease that had left his body strangely deformed, Brunetti and Inspector Vianello set out to try and discover the man's identity. Their investigation eventually takes them to a slaughterhouse at Preganziol, on the mainland. It is there that Brunetti discovers the dead man's connection with the slaughterhouse, and the world of blackmail and corruption that surrounds it. With a gripping case set before a harrowing exploration of the meat industry, Donna Leon's latest novel is a dark and compelling addition to the Brunetti series.

Author Biography

Donna Leon was named by The Times as one of the 50 Greatest Crime Writers. She is an award-winning crime novelist, celebrated for the bestselling Brunetti series. Donna has lived in Venice for thirty years and previously lived in Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Iran and China, where she worked as a teacher. Donna's books have been translated into 35 languages and have been published around the world. Her previous novels featuring Commissario Brunetti have all been highly acclaimed; including Friends in High Places, which won the CWA Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction, Fatal Remedies, Doctored Evidence, A Sea of Troubles and Beastly Things.