A man is shot dead boarding a bus in a Sicilian town square in front of forty people and by the time the carabinieri arrive nobody saw anything. Captain Bellodi, a northerner and a former partisan, investigates, which means construction contracts, a protection racket, and a network reaching up into Rome. Sciascia published the book in 1961, when the official position was that the mafia did not exist, and it’s credited with breaking that silence. It’s a quick read, under a hundred and fifty pages, and the interrogation scenes are a masterclass in people saying nothing at length.
The Day Of The Owl