Thursday, January 28, 2010

Fatal Lies, by Frank Tallis

my edition

 After the last two books written by this author, which were rather lengthy, I was very happy to see a much lighter book here. Much more concise and taut than the previous two books in this series, Fatal Lies begins with the death of a student at a Viennese military academy. Police inspector Oskar Rheinhardt is called away from a ball to go to the scene; he enlists his friend Max Liebermann, a psychiatrist to go with him. Max has been helpful in the past with his experience in Freudian psychology,  and Rheinhardt is all for employing new methods in police procedure to better root out crime.  The two don't realize it yet, but they are stepping into a very troubled atmosphere in the academy, where odd things are occurring and everyone is doing their best to cover things up.

Tallis plies his readers once again with the culinary, musical and literary delights of early 20th-century Vienna, yet manages to interweave all of these with the darkness of international intrigue and the deep and brooding atmosphere of a group of troubled boys.  It is a good read, and one that's hard to put down once you get started.

I'd definitely recommend this one to readers of historical mysteries, as well as to those who have started this series and are considering moving through it.

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