All He Saw Was the Girl, By Peter Leonard

A capital thriller unfolding on the streets of Rome

McCabe, an American studying art history in Rome, falls foul of a violent street gang with Mafia connections.

But McCabe is far from a pushover. Throw in several kidnappings, two Mafia bosses, two beautiful women, an adidas bag full of euros, and an American secret service agent, and you have the ingredients for a fast-paced, smoothly-written thriller which bounces about the streets of Rome like a pinball. It is not flawless – McCabe seems almost too cool to be true, so that the reader can't feel too worried about him; and the ending is rather less exciting than the build-up to it. Still, it's miss-your-stop-on-the-train readable. Peter Leonard must have had his dad, Elmore, beaming in approval at this one.