Rubem Fonseca (born 1925) was Brazil's most highly regarded author of the late 20th century, with a string of critical and popular successes that combined the conventional mystery/thriller format with a sophisticated, polished prose style and a focus on urban alienation.

Rubem Fonseca became one of Brazil's most widely read authors both because of his immense skill at creating believable characters and situations and because his themes addressed an urban population daily more distant from itself. Unlike many Latin American authors who fail to attract a following abroad, Fonseca was a thoroughly cosmopolitan writer who eschewed the exotic or picturesque--a fact that may explain his widespread popularity in Germany, France, and, increasingly, the English-speaking world.

In addressing the catholic human conditions of loneliness, alienation, and frustration, Fonseca was both a Brazilian writer and a universal writer. Using the outward trappings of the thriller and the detective story to...