An unusual pair of sleuths – Adriano Scala, a.k.a. Woodstock, an ineffectual forty-year-old who acquires extraordinary powers of deduction after taking drugs, and deputy commissioner Chiesa, a straight-as-a-die police officer – investigate a heinous crime that has shaken Rome.

 A crime novel with a comedy undertone set in a Rome that’s not so well known.

Adriano Scala – everybody calls him Woodstock. Pushing forty but not much to show for it. He has a temporary job in a primary school and a daughter, but his partner left him a long time ago, as soon as she realised he’d never grow up. But Woodstock has an amazing talent for deduction. A talent that surfaces only when he takes drugs. MD, hashish, marijuana… anything goes to set in motion the first-rate grey cells of this far-Left Sherlock Holmes.

Deputy police commissioner Giacomo Chiesa, on the other hand, is straight as a die. He dresses impeccably, comes from the provinces, is a self-made man, believes in the Law and focusses only on his family and his job.

When the decapitated body of an eleven-year-old child is discovered in San Lorenzo – the old district of railway workers, students and fascists – Chiesa and Woodstock’s paths collide.

pp.272

Our pair of detectives – Woodstock, the left-wing “Sherlock Holmes” from Rome and deputy police commissioner Giacomo Chiesa – return to investigate the apparent suicide of a young heiress amid references to ancient esotericism and ruthless revenge.

Fame has taken a heavy toll on Woodstock and the incorruptible police officer who seemed destined for a brilliant career. They have both lost their jobs and Chiesa even his marriage. They now drown their sorrows in drink. It seems that nothing can save them from failure, when something happens. The young heiress of a dynasty of entrepreneurs with links to the Camorra has committed suicide in Sperlonga. The young woman’s mother does not believe in the official version of events, however, and contacts Woodstock, who agrees to take on the case. Moreover, he agrees to take with him his “best enemy”, Giacomo Chiesa. And so the unfashionable hippy and the former guard with faded charm embark on a riveting enquiry that brings to the surface the thousand secrets and double lives concealed behind the impenetrable curtain of middle-class hypocrisy.

pp.256