Salati Case

Tobias Jones is the author of two travel books, The Dark Heart of Italy and Utopian Dreams. His novel, The Salati Case, was the first in a series featuring the Italian private detective Castagnetti, followed by White Death.In 2012 he published his true crime account of an Italian serial killer, Blood on the Altar.Jones has written and presented documentaries for the BBC, and for RAI television in Italy, and is a columnist for the Observer and Internazionale.He runs a small 'woodland shelter' in Somerset with his wife and three children.

The Salati Case is a tense, gripping detective thriller introducing Castagnetti, a private detective with attitude. Jones has created a sleuth to match Aurelio Zen. -- Patrick Neale Booksellers Choice, The Bookseller 20090410 Scenes and characters are introduced without fuss, the dialogue is quick-fire, and there's the occasional evocative snippet of Italian thrown in. The Salati Case stays the right side of convoluted - and, having solved it, Castagnetti will presumably be back. -- Martin Hemming New Statesman This is a worthy successor to Michael Dibdin. I am sure that Castagnetti, a sternly pensive slogger with a scruffy dress sense, will be back. -- Evening Standard Ian Thomson In many ways this is a routine crime novel, if an unusually agreeable one. The plot is full of twists and turns. There are vivid scenes. Casta is himself a good example of the dogged, often depressed, investigator, with a touch of the "soiled Galahad", the description Raymond Chandler applied to his Philip Marlowe ... But it is a bit more than that. Tobias Jones is the author of a non-fiction book about Parma - The Dark Heart of Italy - and his novel is also, like the best crime fiction, a study of a society and the changes it is experiencing. -- Allan Massie Scotsman Castagnetti is an engaging hero ... characterisation of the other characters is less detailed, but convincing and at times dryly amusing. Tobias Jones has a great sense of the peccadilloes of gossipy secretaries and vain middle-aged men. The depiction of the town is skillful and convincing; the wintry foggy miasma appears somewhat appropriate to the nature of the crime that Casta is investigating. THE SALATI CASE provides an entertaining and intelligent continental variant on the PI/dysfunctional family thriller and I look forward to reading further books in this series. -- Laura Root www.eurocrime.co.uk Jones uses a first-person narrative by Castagnetti, playing the classic crime-fiction game of dare in which the reader is challenged to work out what is going on before the detective does ... [The Salati Case] is taut and thoughtful ... the recent fortunes of the Berlusconi government suggest there will be many more contradictions between Italian sophistication and barbarism to explore, and it would be welcome if Castagnetti ... gets to investigate them. -- Mark Lawson Guardian 'This] promises to be an excellent series. -- Jake Kerridge Daily Telegraph 'Jones's style is closer to the fast-moving staccato rhythms of US crime fiction than the more reflective European model ... Tobias Jones is a fresh new voice of crime fiction; his detective a welcome addition to the ranks of Brit-created Italian heroes.' -- Marcel Berlins The Times Jones is trenchant on the detail of Italianate double-dealing, and his conjuring of the Mediterranean locales is immensely evocative ... a highly promising crime debut. -- Barry Forshaw Independent