BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023 ACCORDING TO GUARDIAN AND THE SPECTATOR

The final novel from one of the greatest writers of the past half century

'No-one nowadays writes prose like Javier Marías . . . If you're already a fan, you'll know what to expect and rejoice. If you're not, what a treat you have in store' The Herald

Tomás Nevinson, a retired MI6 agent, is working for the British Embassy in Madrid when his former handler, the sinister Bertram Tupra, offers to bring him back inside for one last assignment. His mission: to catch and, if necessary, kill a terrorist gone to ground in Northern Spain after bombings in Barcelona and Zaragoza. The trouble is there are three suspects – all women – and it may not actually be any of them. To find out, Nevinson must move incognito to the small town where the three women separately live, and become an intimate friend to each, in the hope of uncovering a clue . . .

A philosophical thriller with a climate of suspense to rival le Carré and a psychological depth that is purely Marias’s own, this is a novel that explores the deepest of human questions: in what circumstances can killing be called just?

Translated by Margaret Jull Costa

'The last word from a master . . . once you've been inside Marías' world, to spend too long outside is unbearable' The Sunday Times

'A twisting espionage tale shot through with slantwise humour . . . seductive and inescapably poignant' Observer

"A meditation on thought and consciousness, identity and disguise, the gloriously rolling sentences offer the deep pleasures of a brilliant mind apprehending the world in real time" - Guardian, '2023 Summer Reads'

"This is a spy thriller, but it reads like one transposed into music . . . Marías mesmerises us again and we are swept on by the long, powerful swells of his prose" - Guardian

"The last word from a master . . . His writing is often thrilling in a way that's distinct from any other author I know . . . once you've been inside Marías' world, to spend too long outside is unbearable" - The Sunday Times

"How we will miss the late Javier Marías and his unique genre of slow-motion page-turners, blending thrillery plots with long, equivocating sentences . . . [Tomás Nevinson] is full of the complexities, comedy and most of all contradictions that define his work" - Guardian, 'Best Translated Novels of 2023'

"A writer who loves the propulsiveness of the thriller, the page-turning compulsion that drives a reader through Eric Ambler or John le Carré" - Financial Times

"Mariás demonstrates why so many of his peers believe him to be among the greatest of contemporary novelists" - The Herald

"The most subtle and gifted writer in contemporary Spanish literature" - Boston Globe

"A Marías sentence is a place of infinite richness and surprises" - Independent

"A Spanish literary great . . . His writing is fine and subtle" - Le Monde

"Marías occupied a reputational perch in Spanish culture that would be almost inconceivable for an American author . . . Most considered him the greatest living Spanish writer" - New York Times

"Javier Marias’s farewell novel sees the late Spanish spellbinder leave us in a droll, delicious, thrillerish labyrinth" - The Spectator 'Best Books of 2023'