Rating: 
Summary: Superb mystery.
Review: I loved this book. It may be that I loved it more having just returned from a vacation in Portugal, but so be it. The mystery is told in the present and past, and it is fun to watch the past and the Nazi mystery move closer in time to the present. What I really liked about the book was the author's ability to use every character and to good economical effect--there are no loose ends. This is a book to read on the weekend, because you won't want to put it down. And you won't want to lose your place in time, because the action goes back and forth so quickly. The added piece is the taste and sights of Portugal. Robert Wilson loves his Portuguesse food, wine, and bicas, and he can take you to Lisbon, Cascais, and Alcantara with his writing. This is well worth a reading.
Rating: 
Summary: A Very Small Death in Lisbon
Review: Robert Wilson is a big deal across the Atlantic. This dark study of revenge that transcends generations really shows why. However, this story is, at times, so dark that one might believe that this sort of thing happens every day in Portugal. The present-day death of a 15 year old tart and its connection to Nazi gold and the Portugese tungsten market in WWII is at the heart of the story. What connection you ask? Well, at first, the only connection appears to be that these two parallel stories, told at the same time, both take place in Portugal and that's it. Wilson makes the connection at the end, but, for me, it is quite a reach. A little too much coincidence for my taste. Still, the intrigue is there as well as the location. I got dizzy with all the street names and locales, especially on the Iberian Peninsula.Characterization is where the fault lies in this book not being a 5-star opus. The characters are not very appealing. Now, granted, some of them are nazis, some are thieves, etc. But, for the first half of the book, the only character that I even remotely cared about was the girl who was murdered - and, techncially speaking, she isn't even a character, just a corpse. Most of the men are portrayed as thugs and rapists. Abrantes, one who parlays the tungsten line into a banking endeavor in Lisbon comes to mind as well as Felsen, an Oscar Schindler wanna-be who beats one of Hitler's goons at a card game and then, for punishment, get's tossed into Himmler's gang of thieves. Case in point: In one scene, at a roadblock, Felsen goes bananas and beats the tar out of a Brit and then tortures him. Does he do this becuase the Brit is a spy or is it because they have both bedded the same girl? And speaking of girls, most of the women are portrayed as ditzy or aloof. Not a good combination. Wilson can't seem to describe any of them without alluding to "frayed knickers" or "worn out nylons". Still, in the second half of the book, Wilson puts some meat, and humanity as well, into his detective, Ze Coelho, and even into his young, upstart partner. The intersecting stories parallel history, as well as politics and even social change and Wilson does a good job there. It's just that if you can find someone to truely care about in this epic, you're a better man than I.
Rating:
Summary: Compelling historical mystery: Nazi Noir
Review: Portugal is not the normal setting for murder mysteries. I don't think I've ever read one set there before, and I've read a lot of books. So it was interesting to see one, and I'll go and look to see if I can get anything else by Robert Wilson, the author of this amazing story of intrigue, smuggling, power, corruption, and vicious murder, set in Portugal in the present, with flashbacks to the WW2 era and later. Ze Coehlo is a homicide detective, breaking in a new partner, with all that you would expect from this as a plot device. His latest case involves a young woman who's been raped and killed, her body dumped on the beach a few hundred feet from his house outside Lisbon. As he investigates the crime, and questions suspicious parents, lascivious boyfriends, and a host of people who were preying on the young woman in one way or another, he begins to unravel a mystery that stretches back more than 50 years. Meanwhile, there are numerous flashbacks. One small difficulty the novel has is the change of voice: the 1990's segments are narrated by Coehlo himself, while the earlier segments are in the third person. Here the main character is Klaus Felsen, a Berlin factory owner with a madame for a mistress, who's trying to make money and avoid service in the SS. The SS "persuades" him to work for them anyway, and he winds up in Portugal, buying large quantities of wolfram, otherwise known as tungsten. This hardened steel is used for armor, shells that penetrate armor, and gun barrels, and is therefore very strategic. So Felsen is sent to Portugal to buy as much as possible, and keep the British from getting as much as he can. He schemes his way through the war, conspires with various partners afterwards, etc. There are doublecrosses and triplecrosses galore in this half of the story, and it's rather amoral: there's no real protagonist. Eventually, the whole of the thing does hang together, and there's a plot twist at the end that's quite deftly handled. The atmosphere is wonderful, Coehlo, his daughter, and his partner are all compelling characters, and the plot is fascinating. I would highly recommend this book, can't speak too highly of it
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding
Review: I've been reading books of this genre for over 25 years and I defy anyone to give me the name of a book much better. I figured out early that I could'nt skim the parts of this type book that I usually do. Early on I missed many little seemingly non important facts and had to keep going back a chapter or two to see what I had missed. I realized I had to read slower and absorb the little stuff. This is important because the middling reviews tend to say how hard to follow the book is. I believe if you read slowly and pay attention to detail, it will make the book so much more fascinating. It did for me and I'm glad I did. It's a great read and so much better than the usual drivel. I'm checking the rest of this guy's stuff and soon.
Rating:
Summary: Don't miss this
Review: If you like thrillers don't miss this. Simply outstanding. The writing itself is enough to make one read and reread some sections. Add to this the educational aspects and the great story and it has few peers. The other Robert Wilson books are available on Amazon UK and I've ordered them all.
Rating: 
Summary: Missed Opportunity
Review: Are you thinking about visiting Portugal? Well, if you are, don't read this book! The country is pictured in an appalling light--virtually all of the men are coarse, brutal rapists, the women are all ..., and it almost seems as if the land itself is to blame. None of the characters are really sympathetic, and much of the descriptive prose could have been eliminated. Having said all of this, the book is well-written, and the premise is very good. It's just too long and too dark. There were times when I actually felt dirty after closing the book. What disturbed me most was that the most amoral, despicable character in the book (the lawyer "father" of the murdered girl) does not get his comeuppance. In a mystery, I want the villain to get justice in the end, and it just doesn't happen here.
Rating:
Summary: In search of an editor !!!
Review: Most good mysteries end after 350 pages. This book screams out for an editor to grab Wilson and yell " enough already !!!"
The book languishes on for another 100 tedious pages as the detective races around Lisbon tying the ends of the crime together. The book has its virtues. Lisbon and Portugal are beautifully described, the meals are appealing and the history behind the plot we can accept as part of the fictional underpinnings but it is too long. If the author did not feel it necessary to give every man, woman and child a few lines of hot ... the book would have really achieved all that the reviewers have written about it
Rating:
Summary: Medium --
Review: I think this is thriller is basically a failure. Although it is often interesting and Wilson has crafted a highly sympathetic protagonist in the form of the Lisbon inspector investigating a murder, the plot does not hang together. There are a few unlikely coincidences and, ultimately, the solution does not meet the smell test in that it is too complex and seems tacked together to tie this complicated novel's many plot threads together at the end. Wilson's weaving in of sex is downright gratuitous (to the point where female readers may be thoroughly turned off) and his style is awash with oddly uniodiomatic English which we could possibly attribute to his long stays outside of Britain. In sum: an overhyped medium-level thriller.
Rating:
Summary: The Author Has Done His Homework
Review: This is a generally well written book...the story, characters and various settings are all rendered in an accurate manner. However I found it hard to develop any empathy for the characters and found the interwoven "plot reveal" at the end far too complicated and contrived. Maybe it's a matter of style over substance...I can see why so many readers liked the material. I wish I enjoyed it as much as those who gave it higher marks.
Rating: 
Summary: Missed It By That Much
Review: This was almost a great book, but has to settle for very good. The character studies were absolutely superb, and for most of the book, the plotting was excellent as well. However, the ending was just a bit too far-fetched to be believable, which took the book down one star. All in all, however, a great read, and a fast one too.
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