A murder in the Alhambra. A lion that no longer behaves as it should. A secret history waiting beneath stone, water, and myth.
In Granada, the Alhambra is more than a monument. It is a city of memory—of poets and rulers, scholars and exiles, the vanished brilliance of Moorish Spain, and the shadows left by conquest, expulsion, and the Inquisition. When one of the lions in the famous Court of the Lions begins behaving in an impossible way, Doctora Graciela Corzal de Moreno, director of the Alhambra, quietly fears that one of the palace’s most contested treasures may no longer be authentic.
She brings together a small circle of people who might help her understand what has changed: Rubén Torres, her gifted assistant; Walter Drummond, a discreet American expert in authenticity and forgery; and Ana Madrizon, a young New Yorker whose family history reaches back into southern Spain. But before the mystery can be contained, violence enters the palace. A young craftsman dies. Then another death follows. Suddenly the question is no longer only what happened to lion number nine, but who is willing to kill for the truth hidden inside the Alhambra’s history.
As the search widens from Granada to Córdoba and into the buried legacies of 1492, Ring of Lions unfolds as both a literary historical mystery and an immersive journey through one of the most storied places in the world. Cass Dalglish threads together architecture, poetry, religion, memory, and murder in a novel of secrets, betrayal, romance, scholarship, and suspense.
For readers drawn to atmospheric mysteries, intellectual suspense, and novels where the past remains alive inside the present, Ring of Lions offers a richly layered story of hidden mechanisms, buried motives, and the dangerous power of what history leaves behind.
Perfect for readers who enjoy:
- historical mysteries set in real cultural landmarks
- literary suspense with art, archives, and hidden histories
- novels of Spain, Granada, Córdoba, and the Alhambra
Reviews
- “Dalglish writes her characters vividly as she weaves the history of the Alhambra and the Moors’ influence into her plot so carefully a reader doesn’t realize how much knowledge she absorbs.” (Mary Ann Grossman, St. Paul Pioneer Press)
- “Reminiscent of Arturo Pérez-Reverte, A. S. Byatt, and Umberto Eco, Dalglish brings together history, architecture, and myth in a murder mystery peopled by transatlantic characters, including two young Americans, one from Cuba and one from New York, tracing their heritage back to southern Spain. In this compelling novel, their personal investment in Spanish history drives our own fascination with its complexities and its far-reaching legacy.” (Becky Boling & D. E. Green, Co-Poets Laureate of Northfield 2023-2024.)
- “I was delighted to feel the influence here, too, of A. S. Byatt’s Possession (1990). Both it and Dalglish’s Ring of Lions draw on the tools of detective fiction, although setting their stories among learned scholars and collectors. Both novels demonstrate that a thirst for knowledge and a penchant for solving puzzles aren’t the only burning passions propelling such work.” (Devoney Looser, author, Sister Novelists: The Trailblazing Porter Sisters Who Paved the Way for Austen and the Brontës)
