Ingenious, always witty and sometimes gruesome short stories by one of Spain’s best-known crime writers. An impressive and very funny collection of stories by Teresa Solana but the fun is very dark indeed. The oddest things happen. Statues decompose and stink out galleries, two old grandmothers are vengeful killers, a prehistoric detective on the verge of becoming the first religious charlatan trails a triple murder that is threatening cave life as the early innocents knew it. The collection also includes a sparkling web of Barcelona stories—connected by two criminal acts—that allows Solana to explore the darker side of different parts of the city and their seedier inhabitants.