In a city on the brink of ruin, a single spark could ignite a continent.

Vienna, 1931.

When a wealthy American is found dead in a burning car in the Vienna Woods, police quickly dismiss it as suicide. But ambitious foreign correspondent Esme Carmichael is tipped off that it was murder. She summons historian Archie Laverick to the Austrian capital, where - still scarred by the Great War and under the guise of researching a famed general - he plunges with Esme into a perilous hunt for the truth.

Their investigation cuts through the glittering façades of a fragile nation. As the catastrophic failure of Austria's largest bank threatens to throw Europe into chaos, Archie and Esme must untangle a web of illicit affairs and stolen identities, navigating the treacherous, gossip-fuelled world of Vienna's elite journalists to unmask a cunning killer hiding in plain sight.

A tense, atmospheric mystery set in a world between wars – perfect for fans of Philip Kerr’s Berlin Trilogy, Robert Harris’s Fatherland, and Alan Furst's spy novels.

'Ridpath has that read-on factor that sets bestsellers apart” The Guardian

'It is the author's insight that gives his novel so much life. And he can write... Yes, he has a winner here' The New York Times

'For sheer entertainment, there's nothing in the mystery genre to beat a well-constructed thriller… …the new book of Michael Ridpath provides a master-class in how it's done The Observer

'As slick and compulsive a piece of storytelling as can be found in the best of blockbuster fiction' Sunday Express