The Girl of His Dreams: A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery: 17 (The Commissario Guido Brunetti Mysteries) - Hardcover

Leon, Donna

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0871139804 ISBN 13: 9780871139801

Publisher: Grove Press / Atlantic Monthly Press, 2008

Synopsis

Donna Leon's Commissario Guido Brunetti mysteries have won legions of fans for their evocative portraits of Venetian life. In her novels, food, family, art, history, and local politics play as central a role as an unsolved crime. In The Girl of His Dreams when a friend of Brunetti's brother, a priest recently returned from years of missionary work, calls with a request, Brunetti suspects the man's motives. A new, American-style Protestant sect has begun to meet in the city, and it's possible the priest is merely apprehensive of the competition. But the preacher could also be fleecing his growing flock, so Brunetti and Paola, along with Inspector Vianello and his wife, go undercover. But the investigation has to be put aside when, one cold and rainy morning, a body is found floating in a canal. It is a child, a gypsy girl. Brunetti suspects she fell off a nearby roof while fleeing an apartment she had robbed. He has to inform the distrustful parents, encamped on the mainland, and soon finds himself haunted by the crime--and the girl. Thought-provoking, eye-opening, and profoundly moving, The Girl of His Dreams is classic Donna Leon, a spectacular, heart-wrenching addition to the series.

About this title

Review:

Donna Leon s engaging books have been the cheapest way to travel to Italy for quite some time -- and her legion of admirers know that the Venice of her protagonist Commissario Brunetti is a wonderful destination for the crime fiction lover. Leon, an American expat who now lives in la Serenissima (with such luminaries as opera singer Cecilia Bartoli as one of her friends) has gone native in no uncertain terms. Her knowledge of Brunetti s water-logged beat is transmuted into vivid and evocative narratives: the Grand Canal and the Rialto Bridge are often the dark passageways to another, darker Italy, where hidden (and not-so-hidden) corruption in politics and daily life is very much an everyday thing (as headlines in the papers not just in Donna Leon s books remind us on a daily basis).

The Girl of his Dreams demonstrates how much life is left in the Leon/Brunetti criminal world. A child s body is found floating near some steps on the Grand Canal it is that of a dead girl. But there have been no reports of missing children -- and the search for the identity of the youthful victim and her family takes Brunetti to many varied destinations, including a Gypsy encampment on the mainland, and (eventually), he turns up some very nasty secrets. As ever, it s not just the villains who thwart Brunetti at every turn it s the venality and clandestine nature of the establishment that hampers him, almost as a matter of course.

This is Leon on effortless form Brunetti fans need not hesitate. --Barry Forshaw

Review:

"In The Girl of His Dreams, Donna Leon is writing at her fluent best." (The Independent)

"Written in a powerful, economical style...Leon's 17th novel is one of her darkest and most reflective." (Guardian)

"Another intriguing episode in this fine series" (Sunday Telegraph)

About this edition

• Publisher: Grove Press / Atlantic Monthly Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0871139804
• ISBN 13: 9780871139801
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 272