The Buenos Aires Quintet — Manuel Vazquez Montalban

Gourmet detective Pepe Carvalho returns to investigate Argentina's turbulent political past.

"The modern committed writer, Montalbán exposes the criminal power relationships beneath the facade of democracy."-Guardian

When Pepe Carvalho's uncle asks him to find his son, Raúl, in Buenos Aires, Pepe is reluctant. All he knows about Argentina is "tango, Maradona, and the disappeared" and he has no desire to find out more. But family is family and soon Carvalho is in Buenos Aires, getting more caught up in Argentina's troubled past than is good for anybody. Montalbán's unique mix of socialist politics, sexual intrigue and cultural underworlds are given a new twist against this South American backdrop.

Manuel Vázquez Montalbán lives in Barcelona, where he was born in 1939. In 1998, Montalbán was awarded the Raymond Chandler Prize for his mysteries.