While the economy of his small South American country collapses, President Veracruz joins his improbable populace of ex-soldiers, former guerillas, unfrocked priests and reformed though by no means inactive whores, in a bizarre search for sexual fulfillment. But for Cardinal Guzman, a man tormented by his own private demons, their stupendous, hedonistic fiestas represent the epicenter of all heresies. Heresies that must be challenged with a horrifying new inquisition destined to climax in a spectacular confrontation The second part of a trilogy, following "The War of Don Emmanuel's Nether Parts," which won the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best First Fiction."