The author of The Doctor, the Detective and Arthur Conan Doyle and the Booker Prize runner-up Islands of Silence, Martin Booth penned this taut psychological thriller, originally published as A Very Private Gentleman and later the inspiration for the George Clooney film The American. Known in the Italian village where he lives as Signor Farfalla—Mr. Butterfly—for the paintings of rare butterflies he makes, the gentleman lives a carefully inconspicuous life. But it is as an artisan of custom-built weapons, his true profession, that he is contacted for a special job—one that he knows will be his last.
"Booth constructs his most focused, tightly written novel to date, reminiscent of William Trevor's classic Felicia's Journey and the late Patricia Highsmith's Ripley novels."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
