A murder. A kidnapping. A lost Salvador Dalí painting. Just 36 hours to resolve all three.
I’m delighted to announce the publication of my new book, ‘The Barcelona Connection’, a fast-paced crime-thriller sprinkled with black comedy. Planned as the first in a series of books about an art detective, the book is also in development as a TV series.
Below are some details about the plot of the new book. You can also click on this Books2Read link to find the best way to purchase your copy, either in print or as an eBook.
From now on, I will also be publishing a new weekly blog, ‘Letter from Spain’ (every Sunday) and newsletter on Substack, where I will mix observations about the news and living in Spain, notes on ‘The Barcelona Connection’ while writing the sequel, plus a ‘behind-the-scenes’ look into developing it for the screen. My blog will no longer appear on this website, so please follow me on Substack!
The Barcelona Connection
Benjamin Blake is no ordinary detective …
Specialising in the criminal underworld of stolen and forged art, things don’t always go the right way for Benjamin. But when they don’t, he has a stubborn determination to put them right.
Within hours of being sent to Barcelona to authenticate a possible Salvador Dalí painting, Benjamin is left stranded without his cell phone at a service station alongside a bloody corpse in the early hours of the morning, after being savagely attacked with his hire car stolen, together with the painting.
Helped and hindered by the fiery Elena Carmona, pursued by a psychopathic hitman, Benjamin becomes the prime suspect in a politically motivated kidnap and murder. All this on the eve of Barcelona hosting a G20 summit and UN climate change conference, with the police in hot pursuit fearing a wider terrorist threat.
From Nîmes in the South of France, across the border to the sweltering humidity of Girona, Barcelona, Figueres and Cadaqués, The Barcelona Connection is a fast-paced, gripping page-turner sprinkled with black comedy, blending the real with the surreal, art crime and mistaken identity … and where the clues at the crime scene might just be the mirror image of a long-lost work of art …