The View from the Tower

"Can she trust them? Can you?" A psychological thriller about love and betrayal, and the damage done when ideals and human lives come into conflict. Helen is in a hotel room with her lover when a gunman murders her husband, Federico, a high-level civil servant, less than a mile away. Helen soon finds herself entangled in a web of suspicion that involves those closest to her - Federico, his parents, and her friend and lover, Giacomo, an ex-terrorist with a new wife and a reinvented life in Paris. As Helen struggles to understand her husband's death and the extent to which she and the people she knows and loves may have been responsible for it, she is forced to examine her own past and the world in which she lives - and to realise innocence is a very scarce commodity.

About the Author :
Charles Lambert was born in England and educated at Cambridge, but has lived in Italy for more than twenty years. His short fiction has been shortlisted for the Willesden Short Story Prize and his story 'The Scent of Cinnamon' won him an O. Henry Prize. His most recent novel Any Human Face was described by the Bookseller as "immensely impressive - holds you completely enthralled throughout" and in The Telegraph Jake Kerridge described it as "a slow-burning, beautifully written crime story that brings to life the Rome that tourists don't see - luckily for them." The View From the Tower and the novel that follows will continue this suspenseful exploration of Rome's dark side.

Review :
Lambert provides a suspenseful examination of political violence, an intensely sympathetic look at love, grief and infidelity and a lovely but gritty "you are there" portrayal of Rome. Vacation season is approaching, and this is the perfect book to take to the beach when you don't want to leave your brain behind!' - The Ivy Bookshop Blog"a superb, deeply thought-out book written by an author who recognizes the darkness of the human heart." - Betty Webb, Mystery Scene Magazine "Honest, sharp, beautifully written." - Ann Cleeves, award-winning author of the Shetland series and Vera novels "A crippling tale of love, loss, redemption, violence, and political intrigue. THE VIEW FROM THE TOWER is a slow burning crime novel that's more about retrospective relationships post death than the mystery surrounding the identity and motives of a killer." - Just A Guy That Likes To Read "Another cracking novel from Charles Lambert that transports the reader to Rome, the everyday Rome that often only the locals are 'privileged' to experience...The things I love about Charles' writing are the great style and the little vignettes that pepper the prose, whether it is the nugget of description of Helen and Federico's dream house, seen from their train compartment; or descriptions of that typical italian marble used for flooring which is ".. a sort of mottled marble, like one of those fatty salamis cut into slices and squared off into tiles" (perfect, I can visualise it now!); or the road to Ostia Antica, the Via del Mare with its dappled light and fast cars, and which is deemed to be the most dangerous road in the country. When you read Charles's work, you just KNOW you are in Italy!" - Trip Fiction "It's about a murder, and the lead up to and consequences of that act. But it's also about relationships. It's about the parts of ourselves we keep hidden, even from those closest to us." - Cheap Thrills "If you are looking for a character-driven story with a political viewpoint then this may well be the book for you to help start this new year off." - So So Gay