Montalbano slammed the lid shut and sat on top of it. When the beam from Livia’s torch shone on his face, he smiled automatically. ‘What are you smiling about?’ ‘Me? I’m not smiling.’ ‘So why are you making that face?’ ‘What face?’ ‘What’s in the trunk?’ Livia asked. ‘Nothing. It’s empty.’ How could he possibly have told her there was a corpse inside? In the lazy month of August, Inspector Montalbano and his girlfriend, Livia, prepare for a relaxing holiday in a villa he has found for them. It is, he assures her, far too hot for anything exciting to happen. But then Livia’s friends’ young son goes missing which sparks a series of events that will certainly ruin the Chief Inspector’s pleasant interlude. A secret apartment and a grisly find in an old trunk are just the beginning: Montalbano must navigate his way through the case as well as coping with the sweltering heat, the suspicious death of an Arab labourer and the tempting lure of a beautiful girl . . . ‘Andrea Camilleri is one of Italy’s finest writers, and he’s on top form in his latest Inspector Montalbano mystery’ Sunday Times