num_pages: 232
description: Parkdales Green Dolphin is a bar of ill repute and it is there that Tancred Palmieri a thief with elegant and erudite tastes meets Willow Azarian an aging heroin addict. She reveals to Tancred that her very wealthy father has recently passed away leaving each of his five children a mysterious object that provides one clue to the whereabouts of a large inheritance. Willow enlists Tancred to steal these objects from her siblings and help her solve the puzzle.A Japanese screen a painting that plays music a bottle of aquavit a framed poem and a model of Frank Lloyd Wrights Fallingwater: Tancred is lured in to this beguiling quest and even though Willow dies before the puzzle is solved he presses on.As he tracks down the treasure he must enlist the help of Alexander von Wrfel conceptual artist and taxidermist to the wealthy and fend off Willows heroin dealers a young albino named Nigger Colby and his sidekick Sigismund Freud Luxemburg a clubfooted psychopath both of whom are eager to get their hands on this supposed pot of gold. And he must mislead Detective Daniel Mandelshtam his most adored friend.Inspired by a reading of Robert Louis Stevensons Treasure Island The Hidden Keys questions what it means to be honourable what it means to be faithful and what it means to sin.
language: English
title: The Hidden Keys
publisher: Coach House Books