Athena by John Banville, the continuation and as far as I know the last book that features Freddie, our Humbert-like, somewhat reformed [or is he?] killer is delicious.
Banville's prose, again flows beautifully, making the most ordinary sort of shill game exceptional.

I highly recommend reading the trilogy in order so as to understand all the references and the reasons for Freddie's anguish. ( )

Banville is possibly the most gifted writer alive today. His evocations of place draw deeply on an intimate connection to weather, smells, and moods created by the shifting lights of day, and his narrators are victims, almost, of an overdeveloped, morbid awareness of their surroundings. Much of his writing struggles with the theme of identity and memory, and there is an ongoing counter narrative which undercuts the authority of the authorial voice. Sometimes this technique may come across as coy, but the general effect is to remind the reader of the provisional nature of storytelling - the arbitrary decisions of where to begin, what to leave out, and which perspective to adopt. In Shroud as well as Athena the narrator has changed his identity to hide a nefarious past. Identity becomes an invented concept on every level - making it up as we go along. Storytelling itself is the point of Banville’s writing, and the richness of his stylistic gift is unsurpassed by any other living writer, with the possible exception of DeLillo and David Mitchell.

I rate "Athena" as possibly Banville's best, right next to "Shroud". ( )