In the process of following Lascano’s investigations, the reader is presented with a finely-drawn portrait of a corrupt Argentina and its ‘Dirty War’. Unable to investigate the first two, who are clearly the victims of the death squads, he is drawn into investigating the third, and soon finds himself in danger as he treads on some highly-placed military toes. When Lascano is directed to investigate a report of two bodies dumped by the riverside, he finds that there are now three dead lying there. The girl makes desperate eye-contact with Lascano ‘and then she is swallowed up by the fog’ (8). In the opening chapter, we see him leaving the house at the beginning of the day, trying to ignore the presumably common sights of bus passengers being searched, and a boy and a girl being driven away in a convoy of military trucks. Superintendent Lascano is a recently bereaved detective (see also Kimmo Joentaa), struggling to maintain his integrity in this morally bankrupt society. This is a hard-hitting crime novel, set against the backdrop of Junta-controlled Argentina in the late 1970s, where power lies primarily in the hands of the military, and ‘disappearances’ of young political activists – supposed ‘subversives’ – are common. Such extra-judicial detentions and executions are typically not questioned by the police (the very body that should be protecting the nation’s citizenry), as doing so is perceived as a pointless exercise that would have extremely negative consequences for the individual. Opening sentence: Some days the side of the bed is like the edge of an enormous abyss.

Ernesto Mallo, Needle in a Haystack, translated from the Spanish by Jethro Soutar (London: Bitter Lemon Press 2010 ). This crime novel paints a searing portrait of 1970s Argentina under military rule 5 stars

Needle in a Haystack by Ernesto Mallo