Aishah Fernandez, distinguished former Deputy Director General of South Africa’s nuclear power regulatory agency, is brutally attacked in her hotel room in Moscow. Four months later, Benny Griessel and his partner Vaughn Cupido—their rank as captains happily restored—find themselves investigating two tragic but seemingly unrelated cases: two small explosions and the suspicious death of private investigator Brandon Maarman. The explosions become all the more mysterious when the motor of a drone with the word “SKORPIO” stenciled on it is found in the rubble.

Dead ends bedevil Benny and Vaughn’s investigations. Strangely, Maarman’s phone records show he spoke several times with Aishah Fernandez, who has since died of an apparent suicide—though the file on her death has been seized by the government for reasons of national security. And the two men seen with Maarman just before he died are brutally murdered. Through it all, Benny is desperately trying to repair the damaged relationship with his son Fritz. As the connections between two dockets become frighteningly clear, the race to save the country from an international disaster is on, with stakes higher than a father’s bond with his son.

Praise for the Benny Griessel Series:

“I love Deon Meyer novels. It’s global storytelling at its best, with the undeniable hallmarks of gritty realism and deep character building. If Harry Bosch had to pick someone to go through a door with, it would be his brother from another mother, Benny Griessel.”—Michael Connelly

“Reminiscent of The Stand and The Passage. Great stuff.”—Stephen King, on The Fever

“Deon Meyer is the monarch of South African crime novelists.”—Financial Times

“[An] outstanding series . . . In word, deed, and spirit, Mr. Meyer’s humane and engaging characters are indeed among ‘the best of the best.’”—Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal

“Deon Meyer is not just South Africa’s greatest crime writer, he’s up there with the best in the world.”—The Times (UK)

“Meyer . . . vividly depicts the story of South Africa in his novels, from the hope and turmoil of the fall of apartheid to the corrupt and desperate aspects of present-day Cape Town . . . Meyer’s novels have an insistent forward motion, and the ones featuring Captain Griessel in particular have a pleasing relentlessness.”—Los Angeles Review of Books

“A serious writer who richly deserves the international reputation he has built.”—The Washington Post

“Meyer utilizes the crime fiction genre as an apparatus to create a multifaceted, unsparing picture of his country.”—The Independent

“South African author Deon Meyer’s Benny Griessel series is one of the high points of contemporary crime fiction.”—The Guardian

“One of the best crime writers on the planet.”—The Mail on Sunday

“Deon Meyer deserves his international reputation.”—Thomas Perry, author of The Burglar

“The undisputed champion of South African crime. Meyer grabs you by the throat and never lets you go.”—Wilbur Smith, bestselling author of Courtney’s War

“Deon Meyer is one of the giants of crime fiction.”—El Mundo

“Mr. Meyer, the leading thriller writer in his native country, traffics in crime-novel situations familiar the world over: drunken cops, charming robbers, dangerous murderers, sudden violence—and sometimes, issues of race. Mr. Meyer’s South Africa, however, is unique. His books, translated from Afrikaans, are usually set in the Cape Town region, where mountains spectacularly meet the sea on the Horn of Africa. Amid these vistas his detective confronts his own—and his country’s—tortured past and the legacy of Apartheid.”—The Wall Street Journal