Northern Italy, 1982: Inspector Piero Trotti is breakfasting at a café when gunmen drive up and shoot the man sitting at the next table. Was Trotti their actual target? He can't be sure. The case falls under the jurisdiction of the local Carabinieri and their detective branch, the Nucleo Investigativo, but Trotti decides to make his own inquiries.<br><i> </i><br><i>The Puppeteer</i> is the follow-up to CWA Dagger-winner Timothy Williams's dazzling crime fiction debut, <i>Converging Parallels</i>. This tautly written novel takes us to the depths of a corrupt, scheming Italian society in which bank officials, clergymen, masons, lawyers, and, of course, politicians are all suspect of resorting to criminal activity for personal gain. Only the police are deemed trustworthy, and even they are sorely divided by departmental rivalries and jealousies.