Unholy Trinity by Paul Adam
I don’t know why it is, but I haven’t read much for the last few months, and so haven’t had much to write in the way of book reviews! Still, the reading bug seems to have caught me again, so I thought I’d just post this little review of Paul Adam’s Unholy Trinity, which I picked up in a bookshop some time ago, and recently got around to reading. It’s not a particularly recent book, first published in 2000, but it was well worth turning the pages.
The plot revolves around Andy Chapman, an Italian correspondent for a British newspaper, who becomes intrigued by the brutal murder of a priest. He goes on to discover that an emissary from the Vatican had cleared his apartment of papers when his body was discovered but before the police were called. This information is turned over to an investigating magistrate in the form of Elena Fiorini, who accidentally reveals to him that she is under pressure from her superiors not to pry too deeply into this case. But these circumstances serve only to whet Elena’s and Chapman’s curiosity to find out exactly what happened and why, a quest which leads them into the Vatican’s archives, to a secret meeting of a banned political party and back to the last days of Mussolini’s dictatorship…
Normally I wouldn’t enjoy the historical flashbacks and detail which are cleverly woven into this thriller, but in this case they do add atmosphere and intrigue, especially with the mention of Mussolini and the surfacing of right wing fascism in modern times. The relationship between Fiorini and Chapman is also kept subtle and doesn’t distract from the main workings of the plot.
All in all a good read with some nice historical detail, well paced and with some unexpected twists to keep the reader on their toes 