The fourth installment in Arturo Perez-Reverte's Captain Alatriste series is The King's Gold, in which our intrepid narrator and his erstwhile master are assigned the grim task of preserving an illicit shipment of gold from the Indies for the king, lest it fall into the hands of his enemies.
This series gets better with each book, I think. I enjoyed the third more than the second, and this one more than its predecessor (there's a new one out already, which I'm sure I'll read sooner or later). As Perez-Reverte's narrator matures, the books gain depth, and this one kept me intrigued from start to finish (even though the general outcome was never in any doubt).
Aside from Inigo and Diego Alatriste, however, I have to say that the characters in these books remain somewhat sketchily drawn; I don't feel like I know much about them. Even Alatriste's alter ego, the nefarious Italian Gualterio Malatesta, isn't described in any great detail (again, perhaps this is simply a product of having the narrator be the young sidekick).
Overall, another satisfactory effort from Perez-Reverte.
