Hopewell, NJ: Ecco Press, (1998.) dj. Hardcover first edition - From the dustjacket: 'A literary thriller from Brazil's best-selling novelist....A grieving film director in Rio--the nameless narrator--is visited by a Carnival dancer who leaves him with a box full of precious gems. A few days later, the dancer is dead, a man in a raincoat lurks outside the director's door, and a mysterious German producer surfaces with an irresistible offer: to make a film based on a story by the director's favorite author, the great Russian writer Isaac Babel.' Translated from the Portuguese by Clifford E. Landers. 312 pp. ISBN: 0-88001-5837.