The Carnival Master
Contents
Cover
About the Book
About the Author
Also by Craig Russell
Title Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Epigraph
Prologue
Part One
Clown Diary First Entry. Dated: 11.11 A.M. 11th November.
Chapter One: 14–16 January
Clown Diary Second Entry. Undated.
Chapter Two: 17–19 January
Chapter Three: 19–21 January
Chapter Four: 21–25 January
Chapter Five: 25–26 January
Part Two
Clown Diary, Fifteenth Entry. Undated.
Chapter Six: 1–3 February
Chapter Seven: 4 February
Chapter Eight: 6–9 February
Chapter Nine: 9–11 February
Chapter Ten: 13–14 February
Chapter Eleven: Women’s Karneval Night. 23 February.
Chapter Twelve: 24–28 February
Epilogue
Copyright
About the Book
The Cologne police know a woman is going to die. They know the day it will happen. And they’re powerless to stop it.
They call on an outside expert: Jan Fabel, head of Hamburg’s Murder Squad and Germany’s leading authority on serial killers.
Fabel is on the point of leaving the police for good, but Carnival in Cologne is a time when the world goes crazy, and he is drawn into the hunt for the Carnival Cannibal. What he doesn’t know is that he is on a collision course with a crack special forces unit from Ukraine and a disturbed colleague with a score to settle.
Fabel finds himself on a trail of betrayal and vengeance, violence and death. And once more he faces his greatest enemy. The true Master of the Carnival.
About the Author
Craig Russell was born in 1956 in Fife, Scotland. He served as a police officer and worked in the advertising industry as a copywriter and creative director. In 2007, his second novel, Brother Grimm, was shortlisted for the CWA Duncan Lawrie Dagger, and in the same year he was presented with a Polizeistern (Police Star) award by the Polizei Hamburg for raising public awareness of the work of the Hamburg police.
For more information about Craig Russell and his books, please visit www.craigrussell.com
Also by Craig Russell
The Jan Fabel Novels:
Blood Eagle
Brother Grimm
Eternal
A Fear of Dark Water
The Valkyrie Song
The Lennox Novels:
The Long Glasgow Kiss
The Deep Dark Sleep
For Holger and Lotte
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the following people for their help and support: Wendy, Jonathan and Sophie; my agent Carole Blake; from Hutchinson, my editor Paul Sidey, Tess Callaway and my copy-editor Nick Austin; Bernd Rullkötter; Erste Polizeihauptkommissarin Ulrike Sweden of the Polizei Hamburg; Dr. Jan Sperhake, chief pathologist of the Institut für Rechtsmedizin; Udo Röbel; and Anja Sieg.
I would also like to thank all of my publishers around the world for their enthusiasm and support.
Karneval in Cologne is a custom dating back to when the Romans founded the city. Its roots probably lie in the dark pagan past of the Celts who occupied the area before the arrival of Germanic and Roman invaders.
Karneval is a time when order is replaced with chaos, when the abstinence of Lent is preceded by abandon and indulgence. A time when the world is turned on its head. When people can become, for a few hours, someone else.