The Sentinel (Vengeance of Memory)

The events of a winter in Madrid 57 years ago haun the present day in this unforgettable journey into the dark heart of Spain

Comandante Leopoldo Guzmán, the infamous head of Franco’s secret police, is a man who disappeared from history in 1953, but his secrets live on. 1953, Madrid: Amid the snow-bound streets of an unprecedented winter, the head of Franco’s secret police discovers that the web of lies he has spun around his past is beginning to unravel. 2009, Las Peñas: Forensic investigator Ana María Galindez unearths a mass grave in a disused mine. Her investigation will disturb forces that have lain dormant for decades. Guzmán is the link between past and present in a country still scarred by civil war, still riven by fear and hatred, and still plagued by secrets that refuse to die.

Mark Oldfield is a criminologist.