Fire on the Island

A Romantic Mystery

Timothy Jay Smith author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Leapfrog Press

Published:3rd Jun '25

Should be back in stock very soon

Fire on the Island cover

Set against the very real refugee crisis on the beautiful, sun-drenched Greek islands, Fire on the Island paints a nuanced and loving portrait of a community in crisis while shedding light on the challenges of life in contemporary Greece. After a string of mysterious fires breaks out on a small Greek island, undercover FBI agent Nick Damigos arrives to investigate, showing up just in time to save a beloved truffle-sniffing dog from the most recent inferno. But as Nick searches for the arsonist responsible, he finds himself navigating a community rife with conflicts, some of which go back generations. As the threat of the next fire looms, Nick begins to uncover the villagers’ countless buried secrets. But Nick has secrets too, and as he falls for a young bartender who becomes his prime suspect, he becomes entrenched in the very mystery he’s trying to solve. With time running out to prevent catastrophe, will Nick expose the truth and save the village, or will the island be engulfed in a blaze of vengeance and heartbreak?

"[Smith's] writing is humane, precise, relentlessly exciting. I dare you to read the opening and not want to race to the finish in one tightly held breath."
- #1 New York Times bestselling author Robert Goolrick
"Smith offers the perfect blend of intrigue, romance, and travelogue."

- Publishers Weekly


"Smith skillfully bridges police procedural and espionage fiction, crafting a show-stealing sense of place and realistically pairing the threats of underworld crime and destabilized regimes." - Booklist
"Timothy Jay Smith's Fire on the Island: A Romantic Thriller follows a gay Greek-American FBI agent Nick Damigos to a gorgeous town in the Greek islands to investigate a mysterious arsonist. More than the mystery of who's setting the fires and why, Smith creates a sensitive portrait of a small Greek community set against the refugee crisis and Greece's suffering economy. It's the town itself -- a chorus of voices -- that is the most compelling character and our reason for "traveling" to Greece.

- Lambda Literary Review


"Timothy Jay Smith's Fire on the Island unveils the complex layers that guise the sun-drenched, bougainvillea-tinted Greek isle, blighted by declining tourism and the seemingly intractable refugee crisis. There are family feuds and a corrupt clergy. There is racism and homophobia. But there is romance, humour and mystery too!"- Athens Insider
For lovers of crime fiction and the allure of the Greek islands, Fire on the Island is the perfect summer read.

ISBN: 9781948585262

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: unknown

288 pages