Hotel Cartagena

Simone Buchholz

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Hotel Cartagena won the 2022 CWA Crime Fiction in Translation Dagger. Twenty floors above the shimmering lights of the Hamburg docks, Public Prosecutor Chastity Riley is celebrating a birthday with friends in a hotel bar when twelve heavily armed men pull out guns, and take everyone hostage. Among the hostages is Konrad Hoogsmart, the hotel owner, who is being targeted by a young man whose life – and family – have been destroyed by Hoogsmart's actions. With the police looking on from outside – their colleagues' lives at stake – and Chastity on the inside, increasingly ill from an unexpected case of sepsis, the stage is set for a dramatic confrontation ... and a devastating outcome for the team ... all live streamed in a terrifying bid for revenge.