The Day of the Owl (New York Review Books Classics)

by Leonardo Sciascia (Author), Archibald Colquhoun (Translator), Anthony Oliver (Translator), George Scialabba (Introduction), Archibald Colquhoun (Translator), George Scialabba (Introduction), Leonardo Sciascia (Author), Anthony Oliver (Translator), Anthony Oliver (Translator)

• New

  Paperback
  2003

  $15.82

• Used

  Paperback
  2001

  $8.10

  This short novel about the mafia is also a mesmerizing demonstration of how that organization sustains itself. It is both a beautifully written story and a brave act of denunciation. A dark-suited man is shot as he runs for a bus in the piazza of a small town. The investigating officer is a man who believes in the values of a democratic and modern society, and soon finds himself up against a wall of silence and vested interests. The narrative moves on two levels: that of the investigator, who reveals a chain of nasty crimes; and that of the bystanders and watchers, of those complicit with secret power, whose gossipy furtive conversations have only one end: to stop the truth coming out.