“I invite you to our death. Will you come? I’m warning you; I won’t take no for an answer. But… Are those tears in your eyes? I take it then that you agree, if I’m to judge by your emotion. I wept too when I conceived of the idea. But don’t you cry. Surrender to me. It all starts now. I promise you will feel nothing but pleasure. And don’t forget that you aren’t the first victim—the first victim was me. Our guest of honour will be joining us shortly. Let’s wrap this up. But do write faster. We need to hurry; he can’t see us like this. My plan cannot fail!”

Petros Eleftheriadis, a policeman working in Homicide, has just handed in his resignation and is ready for a new start. Before he leaves, however, he undertakes to help out on a final case, a body found placed like Da Vinci ;s Vitrouvian Man, with a curious tattoo on the chest and holding a poem with numbers at the start of each verse. Clearly not a simply homicide. His attempts to solve the crime lead him into a story which started twenty years earlier in Thessaloniki, where a student of psychology helps a girl escape from her manic stalker. As time passes, Eleftheriadis discovers evidence and facts that will change his life faster than he anticipated.

An exciting thriller with mathematical riddles, an evocative atmosphere and a storming pace. The present alternates with the past and the reader is constantly faced with successive surprises.

Kastaniotis, 2015, 345 p.