Port Said, 1920. Six days to Trieste. A murderer already aboard.

Alaric von Trelow wants nothing more than to get home. After months in Africa, the Berlin detective has an ageing tramp steamer, a stretch of open Mediterranean, and a stomach that never forgives him for going to sea. All he has to do is endure it.

Then the First Officer is found dead at the foot of a companionway, and everyone seems very keen to declare it an accident. But the dead man's keys are missing, and an anonymous note slides under von Trelow's cabin door. And in a coffin in the hold lies the body of the Governor of Eritrea, shot dead in Massawa days before he was due to board.

The Adriatica is a small ship, and her passengers' secrets may not survive the voyage. Nor may the passengers themselves.

Two men are dead already, and more than one person aboard is willing to add to the number.

Murder on the Adriatic is a closed-circle whodunnit in the classic tradition, steeped in espionage, hidden loyalties, and the violent afterlife of the Great War.