Cendres ardentes

by

When a dismembered corpse is found floating in Lake Léman, Detective Andreas Auer and his team from the criminal brigade are called to the scene. And so begins Auer’s next investigation which is going to be difficult because they have to first figure out who the victim is before they can even attempt to find the killer.

At the same time, Sokol Hoti has gone missing, having arrived in Switzerland just a few months ago in order to find a sister, Dafina, and other family members. Their brother Mirjan has just been killed; his murder was the result of forty years of bad blood between their family and the Hakani family. In 1974, a Hakani killed another one of their brothers which led to more death and destruction for both families. The war between these two families is set against the backdrop of Albania’s recent history as these events took place during the dictatorship of Enver Hoxha and continue on after the fall of communism.

Now is the time for the family rivalry to come to an end, at least that’s what Sokol wants. But Dafina’s son Skënder, a drug trafficker, doesn’t agree, setting the stage for intra-family fighting.

Two more bodies are found; out of the three, two are missing organs. Is it possible that Sokol be one of the victims especially because nothing seems as it appears? Auer and his team’s investigation focuses on Skënder in Marc Voltenauer’s newest fast-paced, well-crafted crime novel.

Marc Voltenauer was born in 1973 to a Swedish mother and German father. He studied Theology at the University of Geneva. As a fan of Scandinavian thrillers, he was inspired to write his own series in the picturesque mountain village of Gryon. Le Dragon du Muveran began what is now a series of five novels featuring Andreas Auer.