The Siege: Winner of the 2014 CWA International Dagger - Tapa blanda

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? (THE CRIME WRITERS' ASSOCIATION)

This is a big and bold novel, rich in character and incident (Nick Rennison THE SUNDAY TIMES)

I was totally drawn in. I felt as though I was living through the siege with the characters - the fear, the hunger, the pretence of normality when a bomb might kill you at any moment. We moved from high-life at the theatre to low in the taverns, from policeman to spy, from Spanish lines to French. I loved the scenes at sea, which were very vividly done. I felt I came to know the characters... This is more novel than crime story, with the murders being a strand in a much larger story, and it's a challenging read - but well worth the effort. If you want something that will engross you wholly in another world, try this. (MYSTERY PEOPLE)

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 (Stephanie Merritt THE OBSERVER)

Peopled with a cast that would not be out of place in an Almodovar film, Perez-Reverte's novel is an intelligent thriller packed with intrigue and romance (Kathy Stevenson 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 (Nick Rennison THE SUNDAY TIMES)

A thrilling novel that is packed with intrigue and romance (Harry Hodges DAILY EXPRESS)

Crime fiction and a historical setting make impressive bedfellows in Pérez Reverte's latest offering... Thrilling. (Martyn Colebrook THE LADY)

A sweeping panorama of life in besieged Cadiz during the Peninsula War (BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE)

Pérez Reverte recreates the whole world through unforgettable characters, notably Lolita Palma, a lone woman running the family merchant house. History, adventure and philosophy. Unless your Spanish runs to terms of a nautical nature, this is best read in translation (Judie Newman, professor of American Studies at the University of Nottingham TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION SUPPLEMENT)