Che Committed Suicide, By Petros Markaris

Euro-crime buffs who have yet to meet the dictionary-loving Inspector Costas Haritos have an Athenian treat in store. Markaris is no formula-bound hack but a versatile author who, in his mysteries, turns the hero's sleuthing into a spotlight on a fast-changing Greek society.

Here, in another sturdy translation by David Connolly, a shady entrepreneur with rich building contracts for the 2004 Olympics kills himself in public. Other suicides follow, the victims somehow linked by their part in protest against the Junta of 1967-74. His grip on history aside, Markaris – an incomer from Istanbul - always delights with his loving but exasperated scenes of daily life in clogged Athens.