St Petersburg, 1914. Dr Otto Spethmann, a famous psychoanalyst, is implicated in a murder. But he is preoccupied with Avrom Rozental, the brilliant chess master who is due to play the most important competition of his life but is on the verge of a breakdown.
'This classy, literate thriller is about chess, psychoanalysis, Russian skullduggery, history, mystery, romance - and more'