The informants, who included officers in the Argentine intelligence service as well as an Argentine Ambassador to Spain, took part in the military's confiscation and eventual return of the body.

Explaining his reason for telling the story in a novel, which was published this month and was at the top of the best-seller list here this week, Mr. Martinez said what he learned about the fight for Eva Peron's body from the informants and from his own research was "so incredible, so unbelievable that it had to be written in the novel style."

"The novel is the most effective way of telling the truth, especially about a person like Eva Peron, whose character has taken on mythical qualities in Argentina," said Mr. Martinez, who is one of Argentina's most prominent authors. While some names, places, and events have been altered, the novel is a reconstruction of the truth, he said.

So far, no one is disputing the basic facts in the book: Military leaders who overthrew Mr. Peron in 1955 confiscated Eva Peron's corpse because they were afraid that the opposition would use the body to rally the populace.

But wherever they hid the body, even in the most secure military buildings, there were problems keeping it from admirers, who would repeatedly place flowers and candles nearby, Mr. Martinez said. So the military eventually sent the body to a secret burial site in Italy, and after 16 years, her husband, exiled to Spain, recovered it and returned it to Buenos Aires.