A war criminal on the run. A mercenary hunting him down. A man caught in the crossfire. Private Investigator Makana has a new client: the powerful art dealer Aram Kasabian. Kasabian wants him to track down a priceless painting that went missing from Baghdad during the US invasion. All the dealer can tell Makana is that the piece was smuggled into Egypt by an Iraqi war criminal who doesn't want to be found. The art world is a far cry from the shady streets and dirty alleyways of the Cairo that Makana knows, but he discovers that this side of the city has its own dark underbelly. Before long, he finds himself caught between dangerous enemies on a trail that leads him into the darkness of war and which threatens to send the new life he has built for himself up in flames.

Trade paperback. Cairo is haunted by the ghosts of war, and Private Investigator Makana finds himself on a quest for lost treasure that soon turns deadly. '...a literary novelist uses the crime genre to terrific effect' "Sunday Times"

Lovable ex-policeman Makana . The Mcguffin at the centre of the plot is a missing painting smuggled into Egypt by an Iraqi war criminal, enabling Bilal to make sly commentary on the state of the Middle East. This beautifully written series just gets better and better