The fig eater / Jody Shields

"Vienna, 1910 - Freud's Vienna, a city of horse-drawn carriages, masked balls, and gaslit cafes hovers on the threshold between darkness and light, superstition and science. The murder of Dora, the haunted daughter of a respectable bourgeois family, is being investigated by the Inspector, newly schooled in rationalist criminology. Almost every aspect of the case remains hidden, untouchable. He is trying to find the "error in the situation"- that small link that will lead him to the truth." "His wife, Erszebet, a Hungarian steeped in intuition and the lore of Gypsy mysticism, becomes obsessed with the murder and lauches her own parallel, secret investigation. She is sure that the figs found in Dora's stomach are the clue to the identity of the murderer - for there are no fresh figs in Vienna at this time of the year. With the help of a young British governess, she unmasks an entirely other face of the crime, and of the society that would prefer it to be repressed forever."--BOOK JACKET.