In this award-winning novel, acclaimed Brazilian writer Edgard Telles Ribeiro illuminates a dark corner of his country's history.

Marcílio Andrade Xavier is a charismatic young diplomat whose intelligence is matched only by his ambition. During the military dictatorship of 1964–1985, Max's artful manoeuvring — political and personal — assures him a meteoric career as democracies topple throughout South America. Yet Max remains an enigma to his colleagues, his friends, and even his wife, who know few details of his involvement with oppressive regimes, let alone the CIA and MI6.

Amid embassy machinations, glittering parties, dire acts, and revealing, intimate encounters, one of Max's younger colleagues starts piecing together who Max really is, and at what cost he has purchased his dazzling career.

A political thriller of the highest order, His Own Man is a chilling anatomy of power, ambition, and betrayal.