We see an overview of the geography and history of the country that comprises 50% of the landmass and population of the South American continent. Five distinct regions make up Brazil: the Northern, the Northeastern, the West Central, the Southeastern, and the Southern. From small native populations of the Amazon to the world's third-largest city, Sao Paulo, we experience one of the world's countries with both the greatest potential and the most serious problems.
"The Villa of Mysteries", the second novel in the Italian crime series set in Rome, features Caravaggio-loving Detective Nic Costa. In this title, when a young woman turns up dead in a peat bog, a maverick pathologist thinks she's the victim of an ancient Roman ritual. But she's wrong.
Back in Rome after their dramatic adventures in Venice, Costa, Peroni and Leo Falcone are rebuilding their lives. But they team up once again when faced with the sudden appearance of fresh bloodstains on a missing young boy's T-shirt in a small museum exhibit displaying supposed evidence of communication from souls in Purgatory. Soon they find themselves embroiled in a mystery involving both the ancient cult of Mithras and a sinister ossuary, the House of Bones.
For the first time in decades The Eternal City is paralysed by a blizzard. And a gruesome discovery is made in the Pantheon - one of Rome's most ancient and revered architectural treasures. Covered by softly falling snow is the body of a young woman - her back horribly mutilated...But before Nic Costa and Gianni Peroni of the Questura can begin a formal investigation the US Embassy has brought in its own people, FBI Agents who want the case closed down as quickly and discreetly as possible.
Ex-cop Bierce has been in prison for over twenty years following his conviction for the murders of his wife and son. He has no memory of the tragedy and has never been able to say with certainty that he didn't do it - except he cannot imagine why on earth he would have killed his beloved family. Unexpectedly released moments before his execution, he teams up with the beautiful, feisty, half-Chinese Alice Loong, who is seeking answers to her own troubled past and the death of her mother on that same day in 1983.
