A Feast for the Flies

A gruesome persecution: former inspector Swoboda versus a fanatical secret order

The body of the dead woman is covered with a shimmering, bluegreen, buzzing layer… Retired police inspector and painter Alexander Swoboda is going through a serious emotional crisis when, involuntarily, he gets caught up in investigating a series of murders. The killings are evidently the work of a self-appointed modern Inquisition, a secret order whose coat of arms is comprised of a cross and a sword. Too late, the detective realises that his investigations are responsible for leading the perpetrators to their victims, and the sect’s fanatical crusade against those they see as present-day heretics soon turns into a nightmare for Swoboda …

Gert Heidenreich is a freelance author and journalist whose voice is familiar to German audiences through his work on TV documentaries, radio and audiobooks. As well as writing novels, poetry and stage plays, he has regularly contributed reports on Sahara, Black Africa, India and Central Asia to Die Zeit and the travel magazine Merian. His work has won many awards, including the Adolf Grimme Award in 1986, the Phantastik Prize in 1995, and the Marieluise Fleißer Prize in 1998. His most recent published novels are the first of his Inspector Swoboda crime series, In the Darkness of Time (2008), and his latest novel The Night of the Traders (2009).