Winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award
Winner of the Alfaguara Prize

Winner of the Gregor von Rezzori Prize

'A powerful, humane novel about a man trying to make sense of a war he didn’t choose to fight' The Times

'The story is compelling but through Vásquez’s vivid prose (rendered brilliantly into English by the award-winning translator Anne McLean) it also becomes haunting … A poignant and perturbing tale about the inheritance of fear in a country scrabbling to regain its soul' Financial Times

No sooner does he get to know Ricardo Laverde in a seedy billiard hall in Bogotá than Antonio Yammara realises that the ex-pilot has a secret. Antonio's fascination with his new friend's life grows until the day Ricardo receives a mysterious, unmarked cassette.

Shortly afterwards, he is shot dead on a street corner.

Yammara's investigation into what happened leads back to the early 1960s, marijuana smuggling and a time before the cocaine trade trapped Colombia in a living nightmare.