O FORTUNA

O FORTUNA is a novel set on the French Riviera in the early 1990s, a mystery thriller, wryly philosophical as well as tense. It tells the story of Gallagher, back in Europe after forty years in Asia, on a quest to find the woman he would have married had he not gone missing in action in Korea in 1952. His search, misdirected by confusions of identity, draws him into the family of the man she married, a world of secrets and subterfuge dominated by quarrels over ill-gotten wealth and the attention this has attracted from the criminal underworld, the plot advancing through revelations of acts and events long past as well as present, of dissimulation, treachery and violence, of robbery and embezzlement, constraint and extortion, suicide, infanticide and murder. In the rapid twists and turns of his involvement, Gallagher finds sanctuary in cold beer and Fortuna. She it is who surrounds us with uncertainties, keeps us guessing and alert, intrigued and curious about things, a beautiful, fascinating goddess, sometimes light-hearted, sometimes serious, often excessive but never dull, and very different from the ugly and implacable Fates.