It is December 2001 & Argentina is in political & economic meltdown. Pablo Martelli, once in an elite branch of the police force known to all as the ` National Shame`, is a shadow of his former self, scraping by as a bathroom salesman. He cannot forget the enigmatic woman he met in a dance hall. She left him when she found out who he was working for, & he has never recovered from the blow. Late one evening, Martelli is summoned to a friend`s coastal retreat. He arrives to find his friend dead & is drawn into a bewildering sequence of events, on an odyssey that leads him through vast, empty pampas, along endless highways & into ghost towns seething with danger & brutality, to the ailing heart of his country. Before long he is forced to uncover the truth of his past life. It is a dangerous confession: after all, no-one loves a policeman. A highly original crime novel with a rich, dark humour, a host of extraordinary characters & plenty of smoking guns.