Set in Spain in 1941 during the rule of General Franco and the Falangists, with their connections to the Nazis, and again in 1981, in the run-up to the first real democratic elections, debut author Victor del Arbol creates a whirlwind of mysteries within mysteries that will keep even the most demanding reader entertained. Filling the novel with twists and turns, surprises, and action that doubles back on itself, the story line constantly changes, rewriting the information we think we already know, and creating new complications to ponder as we try to reconstruct what we think is happening. The interrelationships among the main characters and their families continue for the forty years of the time span, becoming ever more complex as motivations, betrayals, lies we have accepted as truth, and characters who are not who we think they are become central to the action.
As the novel opens in May, 1981, thirty-five-year-old Maria Bengoechea lies dying in a Barcelona hospital. A successful lawyer who has prosecuted people regarded by the government as dangerous to the country, Maria is having difficulty reconciling herself to her fate. A coup attempt, which had occurred in February of that year, had led to the arrest of a few of the main conspirators, but many of their right-wing supporters remain in office, and Maria is unwilling to reveal some of their secrets which could affect many other lives. A police guard outside her door remains there, in case she changes her mind, but she has no intention of telling the police what they want to know - there is too great a chance that those who still retain power might act against people she feels honor-bound to protect.
The next scene flashes back to 1941, when a beautiful and influential woman, Isabel Mola, and her disturbed son Andres are waiting for a train that will take them away from her abusive husband Guillermo, whose assassination she had plotted. Though Isabel never appears again in the story, her long-felt influence continues throughout the novel. Who killed her, who witnessed the killing, who is lying, and, more importantly, who, if anyone, is telling the truth, are issues which continue for forty years and are still an issue as Maria lies dying in hospital forty years later. The third part of the story surrounds Andres's teacher, Marcelo Alcala, who had come to Barcelona in 1941 to teach Andres, bringing his son Cesar with him. Though Marcelo disappears from the action, his son Cesar later becomes a police officer whom Maria prosecutes.
Complex and challenging in its plotting, the novel is also energetic and fast-paced. The characters are memorable, in part because none of them are perfect, and several are trapped into committing terrible acts because they believe they have no choice. Ultimately, the novel raises questions more challenging than those of the typical mystery: questions of our own identities, our perceptions of ourselves and others' perceptions of us, along with the deliberate manipulation of those perceptions by groups or individuals (often politicians) who wish to affect our ideas of guilt and innocence, right and wrong. Extremely clever, unusual in its focus, and carefully plotted to keep the interest and excitement high, this novel could well become one of the hits of the summer. Mary Whipple
