Brenner and God

Introducing one of Europe's most widely popular detective series

Wanting out of high-stress detective work, Simon Brenner takes a calming job as a chauffeur, shuttling a two-year-old girl back and forth in a soothing ride along the Autobahn between her father, a construction tycoon in Munich, and her mother, an abortion doctor in Vienna.

Except then one day he stops at a gas station to buy the little girl a chocolate bar and comes back to find she’s been kidnapped . . . and suddenly he’s out of a job, thoroughly stressed out, and a detective again.

With no shortage of leads—both the father’s latest development and the mother’s clinic are under siege by protestors—Brenner makes his way through a powerful cast of characters and a growing pile of bodies to solve the crime in the only way he knows how: By being in precisely the right place at the worst possible time.

Told with sharp-edged wit, suspense that’s even sharper, and one of the most quirky, hilarious, and compelling narrative voices ever.

Wolf Haas was born in 1960 in the Austrian province of Salzburg. He is the author of seven books in the bestselling Detective Brenner mystery series, three of which have been made into popular German-language films. Among other prizes, the Brenner books have been awarded the 2004 Literature Prize from the City of Vienna and the German Thriller Prize.

Annie Janusch is the translator of the Art of the Novella edition of Heinrich von Kleist’s The Duel.