The creation of Inspector Montalbano

On 10 March 1994, Italian author Andrea Camilleri's The Shape of Water was published.

It features Inspector Montalbano in the fictional Sicilian town of Vigàta.

The novel is widely credited with helping start a new wave of Italian noir.

It is the first book in a series that has had worldwide sales of 25 million and has been translated into 120 languages.

Jen Dale uses BBC Archive to tell the story of how the fictional detective was created.

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(Picture: Italian writer Andrea Camilleri. Credit: Leonardo Cendamo/Getty Images)