Intent to Deceive — David Fisher

This third book in the DCS Frank Kruger trilogy is a finely paced and compelling story set against the background of the world of fine art. It centres on an investigation to track down the murderer of a prominent art dealer who is found poisoned in his hideaway villa in the Austrian mountains.

The plot of this psychological and suspenseful crime mystery is driven by greed and fear and involves a group of people who find themselves instruments of an obsessively ambitious man for whom wealth is a measure of success and not a goal.

The knotty murder investigation takes the reader into the labyrinthine world of art forgery which few realise exists while uncovering a forgery network run by a hard-nosed but glamorous Swiss woman and exposing an arcane conspiracy based on a fake will and a family secret.

Despite having a row of suspects, the motive for murder eludes Kruger until one seemingly harmless chance remark on the part of a minor suspect opens the way to putting the pieces of the puzzle together and unmasking the culprit.