The Last Cut (Mamur Zapt, Book 11)

Description

In this classic mystery from Michael Pearce's award-winning series, set in the Egypt of the 1900s, the Mamur Zapt investigates the discovery of a young woman's body at the site of a dam. Cairo, 1908. When an attempt is made to blow up a key regulator in the Cairo Barrage, the Mamur Zapt, British head of Cairo's secret police, is called in to investigate. To make matters worse, the ceremonial cutting of a dam always requires careful policing, especially on this occasion as it is going to be the Last Cut. Which means the discovery of a young woman's body at the site of the dam is extremely embarrassing. Is this the traditional ritual sacrifice? Or something more sinister?

Michael Pearce grew up in the (then) Anglo-Egyptian Sudan among the various tensions he draws on for his award-winning Mamur Zapt series. He returned there to teach, and retains a human rights interest in the area. In between whiles his career has followed the standard academic rake's progress from teaching to writing to editing to administration. He finds international politics a pallid imitation of academic ones. He lives in London. He is now a full-time writer. He was awarded the Crime Writers' Association's prestigious Last Laugh Award for funniest crime novel of the year for the 'Mamur Zapt and the Spoils of Egypt'. Michael Pearce is also the author of the crime novels featuring Dmitri Kameron, set in Tsarist Russia of the 1890s.

'Takes apart ancient history and reassembles it with beguiling wit and colour' Sunday Times 'Marvellously convoluted... Dryly and deeply funny' Literary Review 'Urbane, intelligent and never patronising, Pearce writes about Egypt with the observant eye of the lover who sees yet forgives all faults' Val McDermid 'Irresistible fun' Time Out 'An entertaining story in which the author has cleverly woven a mystery into the background of the city, bringing it and its varied population to noisy life' Sunday Telegraph