A thriller, a mystery, and still a moving examination of family, loss, and the amorphous and magical potential of language itself.

Risk analyst James Axton lives in Athens and works across Greece and the Middle East, part of a community of American ex-pats that includes his estranged wife and child. Their peripatetic existence is interrupted when a horrific, unexplained murder on the island of Kouros becomes the catalyst for Axton becoming embroiled in a dizzying conspiracy of ritualistic violence, cultism, and ancient languages. Evocative, complex and beguiling, The Names is another major work from one of the 20th century’s great prose stylists.

Part of the Picador Collection, a series showcasing the best of modern literature.