The Siege

Cadiz, 1811. While the city is under siege from the marauding French army, an even greater menace is lurking within the city walls: a serial killer is on the loose, flaying young women to death. Each of these murders takes place near where a French bomb has just fallen. In order to find the murderer, police commissioner Rogelio Tizon begins to perceive the city as a vast chessboard as he tries to predict his unknown opponent's next deadly move.

In the claustrophobic atmosphere of the besieged town, an heiress, an unscrupulous corsair captain, a taxidermist who is also a spy and a hardened soldier begin to cross paths, and behind them all the figure of Tizon is getting closer to deciphering the lethal pattern behind the murders...

With all the intrigue and romance of Perez-Reverte's bestsellers, The Dumas Club and The Flanders Panel, THE SIEGE is the story of a city and a people who will never be the same again.

Winner of CWA Daggers: International 2014 (UK)

“That rare thing, an old-fashioned, proper, big novel: The Siege is as much a thickly described historical fiction as a many-layered crime novel. The judges admired the claustrophobia of the siege of Cadiz (for both sides) during the Peninsular War that forms the detailed background to the investigation and the author's serious ethical intentions. To quote Orson Welles, Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?”

Arturo Perez-Reverte's bold new thriller ... THE SIEGE is his best yet: an ambitious intellectual thriller peopled with colourful rogues and antiheroes, meticulous in its historical detail, with a plot that rattles along to its unexpected finale - OBSERVER

Perez-Reverte's novel is an intelligent thriller packed with intrigue and romance - DAILY MAIL

Arturo Perez-Reverte has long been Spain's most popular, inventive writer of historical fiction ... this is a big and bold novel, rich in character and incident - SUNDAY TIMES

Arturo Perez-Reverte is the great European storyteller of the 21st century

Arturo Perez-Reverte lives near Madrid. Originally a war correspondent, he now writes fiction full time. His novels include THE FLANDERS PANEL,THE CLUB DUMAS, THE FENCING MASTER, THE SEVILLE COMMUNION, THE NAUTICAL CHART, THE QUEEN OF THE SOUTH and the bestselling Captain Alatriste series. In 2003 he was elected to the Spanish Royal Academy. His website can be visited at (Spanish language) or follow him on Twitter at

Cadiz, 1811. While the city is under siege from the marauding French army, an even greater menace is lurking within the city walls: a serial killer is on the loose, flaying young women to death. Each of these murders takes place near where a French bomb has just fallen. In order to find the murderer, police commissioner Rogelio Tizon begins to perceive the city as a vast chessboard as he tries to predict his unknown opponent's next deadly move.In the claustrophobic atmosphere of the besieged town, an heiress, an unscrupulous corsair captain, a taxidermist who is also a spy and a hardened soldier begin to cross paths, and behind them all the figure of Tizon is getting closer to deciphering the lethal pattern behind the murders...With all the intrigue and romance of Perez-Reverte's bestsellers, The Dumas Club and The Flanders Panel , THE SIEGE is the story of a city and a people who will never be the same again.

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