The Ludi Victor — James Leigh

"The branch whipped forward and smashed into him precisely where I intended it should - full in the throat. I know something of medicine, and I think he must have died instantly from the blow. He fell forward in the stream, the current took him, and he fetched up at the dam caused by a fallen tree-trunk. He bobbed there, face-down." Such is the latest in a sequence of murders committed in many countries across several continents. And so begins the investigation into a multi-million pound insurance fraud that will end with death in the Grand Canyon and an ultimate Ludi Victor. 'Mature, sophisticated, civilized' NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 'A coruscating English thriller... spun with a confidence which concusses disbelief' GUARDIAN