Chief Inspector Max Cámara Books
In the thrilling follow-up to Or the Bull Kills You , Detective Max Cámara must investigate the murder of a renowned paella chef and threats against a local abortion clinic in a brilliantly atmospheric Spanish setting. Detective Max Cámara is under pressure. A renowned paella chef has been found dead; the town hall are set on demolishing El Cabanyal, the colourful fisherman's quarter on Valencia's sea-front; an abortionist has been kidnapped and with the Pope due to visit the city, the police are summoned to offer protection from crowds of the faithful and the danger of anti-religionists alike. When one of Cámara's long term adversaries is put in charge of the missing abortionist case, tensions are quickly running high, and with ominous cracks spreading across the walls of his flat, Cámara soon has nowhere to turn.
Sent on leave after his last, brutal, case, Max Cámara returns to his home town in La Mancha, famous for producing the finest saffron in the world. There, the past keeps pulling at him. The town is exhuming a mass grave from the Civil War, but why is his grandfather behaving so strangely? His old friend Yago is investigating a particularly nasty murder which sets off memories Max has been trying to bury for years. And then there are Yago’s whisperings about a saffron mafia. Max finds himself plunged into the thick of a complex and intensely personal case that will put him in severe danger and have him questioning his past—and his future in the police.
Spain is corrupt and on the brink of collapse.The king is ill, banks are closing, hospitals are in chaos, homes are lost, demonstrators riot and rightwing thugs patrol the street. The tunnels beneath the streets are at once a refuge and a source of anger. And as the blood flows, Cámara roars in on his motorbike. He's is back in Valencia and in the old police headquarters the mood is tense as the chief hunts for cuts—who will go, Cámara or his friend Torres? The two men are flung into action investigating the suicide of an ex- bank clerk and the brutal murder of a young American woman. As the city erupts around them, their case takes them into the heart of the trouble.
Tensions in Spain are rising: political violence and social unrest have re-emerged. In Catalonia, the call for independence is getting louder. The last time Barcelona moved to break away, in the 1930s, Spain descended into civil war. A shallow grave is found among abandoned orange groves outside Valencia. Chief Inspector Max Cámara, heading up the new Special Crime Unit, is on the case—but he uncovers a tangled web that could decimate Barcelona and destabilize the whole country. The stakes are higher than anything he’s ever known.
In the hills above Valencia is a notorious nightclub called Sunset. When its larger-than-life owner, Jose Luis, dies suddenly, everyone assumes it was a heart attack. Perfectly understandable for a man of his age, size and lifestyle. Meanwhile, all is not well for Max Cámara at HQ. His new boss, Rita Hernández, has it in for him and his idiosyncratic methods. He must abandon a complex investigation into home-grown extremism to check out what looks like a routine death at Sunset. But an anonymous phone call suggests otherwise… Back in the city, Max’s journalist girlfriend, Alicia, is working on a lead that could turn out to be the story of her career. How her own investigation connects with Max’s at Sunset, and an unholy network of drug dealers, priests and shady officials protecting a dark government secret, will place both their lives in jeopardy and push everything to the very edge.