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"In his many years as a commissario, Guido Brunetti has seen all manner of crime and known intuitively how to navigate the various pathways in his native city, Venice, to discover the person responsible. Now, in Transient Desires, the thirtieth novel in Donna Leon's masterful series, he faces a heinous crime committed outside his jurisdiction. He is drawn in innocently enough: two young American women have been badly injured in a boating accident, joy riding in the Laguna with two young Italians. However, Brunetti's curiosity is aroused by the behavior of the young men, who abandoned the victims after taking them to the hospital. If the injuries were the result of an accident, why did they want to avoid association with it? As Brunetti and his colleague, Claudia Griffoni, investigate the incident, they discover that one of the young men works for a man rumored to be involved in more sinister nighttime activities in the Laguna. To get to the bottom of what proves to be a gut-wrenching case, Brunetti needs to enlist the help of both the Carabinieri and the Guardia di Costiera. Determining how much trust he and Griffoni can put in these unfamiliar colleagues adds to the difficulty of solving a peculiarly horrible crime whose perpetrators are technologically brilliant and ruthlessly organized. Donna Leon's Transient Desires is as powerful as any novel she has written, testing Brunetti to his limits and forcing him to listen very carefully for the truth"--… (more)
User reviews
I have been intermittently reading some of the Brunetti mysteries and always find them fascinating, but not always for the same reasons. I love the interactions among colleagues, the in-depth
I requested and received a free ebook copy from Grove Atlantic/Atlantic Monthly Press via NetGalley. Thank you!
Interesting how so many arguments popped up about oblique things supported by tangential facts used in justification of almost anything. How did he miss “the coronation of the non sequitur?” And precisely what does that have to do with the crime at hand? What indeed - no answers here.
OK, Brunetti is still reading the classics, Tacitus in this case and promulgating trusting only “the unvarnished truth.” Another parallel, more obscurity. But it makes Brunetti more interesting, more fallible, just a slightly bit more fussy but never less perceptive. Clarity comes from listening and understanding the concept and hopelessness of “a love that dared not speak its name”.
Then the alienation, the confrontation, the last page and dang where is the ending? I kept turning the page but there were no more words.
Thank you NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for a copy.
Whenever I take up a Donna Leon novel on commissario Brunetti, I know what I will get: a crime story which is solved not by some miraculously appearing deus ex machina, but by meticulous police work combined with the protagonist’s clever instinct and the ability to read people and to actually listen to them. Apart from that, it is always like some kind of bookish holiday to travel to the Venetian Lagoon and to delve into its very unique atmosphere. The thirtieth instalment in the series does not disappoint in this respect.
Quite interestingly, the crime with which the novel opens is quite quickly solved and classified an accident and a series of unfortunate events and decisions. Yet, it is only the beginning of a real crime – a crime of the sort nobody wants to know about and people eagerly close their eyes on. This time, it is Brunetti’s colleague who stirs the investigation and the commissario not only gets to know her from an unknown side but also learns that Griffoni’s hometown of Naples could also be on another planet that different life works there.
A plot driven by interesting and strongly painted characters, just the sort of entertainment one knows Donna Leon to provide.
In this thirtieth volume looking at police procedurals and crime in Venice fewer tourists are in evidence given the pandemic. However in this latest work from Leon two young American women are injured in a boating incident on the Laguna, one dreadfully. They are
The enquiry becomes complicated. One of the men in the boat is the nephew of Pietro Borgato, owner of a large International transport company, who whilst he's never been caught, is suspected of being involved in various smuggling operations.
Commissario Guido Brunetti is as ever erudite and thoughtful. Napoletana Claudia Griffons, Brunetti’s colleague is a shrewd successful woman working in a male dominated world. They work well together.
As the case evolves we have the coast guard becoming part of the action (that is interesting)
the Nigerian mafia is made mention of and things become very twist and cloak and daggerish. Mention of empty cruise ships and lack of tourists place this mystery fairly and sqaurely in the now.
On the home front, the children are becoming older and there's interesting discussions around the table.
This case raises many questions for Brunetti especially as his children are getting older.
I love Brunetti and this latest walk with him didn't disappoint.
I love the glimpses of Venice we view through Leon's prism. I always had the romantic idea of living in Venice for a few months--the most I managed was a few days, but I loved every moment.
Reading about Brunetti extends that love affair--every time! Even if it's gritty and edgy adding another yet layer.
A Grove Atlantic ARC via NetGalley
With the use of security tapes, the Commissario Guido
The fact that they fled the scene made the men targets of an investigation. One was a young lawyer; the second the nephew of a very wealthy warehouse and shipping company owner with a questionable reputation.
The incident occurred outside Guido’s turf so he teamed up with officials from other departments to investigate.
Their work turns up a horrific crime, one that is ongoing, and they work to resolve it, not knowing who they can trust for information.
TRANSIENT DESIRES, like the 29 previous Donna Leon Brunetti mysteries, is well-written and has an intricate, but plausible plot. There is interesting discussion about the reading and teaching of Paula Brunetti, Guido’s wife, as well as Venetian newspapers and politics. The various Italian accents, mentioned frequently in the books as a way to classify people, proves very handy.
The ending left me wanting another chapter to learn what happened to some of the characters.
I lowered my rating by one star because of too many unnecessarily short chapters.
The plot is set against the strong sense of place and character of present-day Venice and its people. His detective work competes with Brunetti's unique lifestyle, but allows him to meet interesting people. In that way, it's a lighter police procedural but strong on characterization. In this story, regional suspicions are explored as Brunetti, a native Venetian, sees a different side of Griffoni, a native of Naples, when she interacts with a fellow Neapolitan. Similarly, there's the under the radar homosexual relationship between the two young men involved in the boating mishap. Brunetti is affected by the fact that they are close in age to his own son.
It's a satisfying well-constructed story made charming by the Venetian locale and plenty of credible and interesting characters. It can easily be read as a standalone despite there being many previous books in the series.
By now we know
This is a short novel and while I liked it, as I like all of this series, I don't recommend it as your first taste, if somehow you have not sampled this series before. Start with the early, longer novels, not because they are better but because they are meatier and allow you to get to know Donna Leon and the Venice police on their own terms.
I received a review copy of TRANSIENT DESIRES by Donna Leon from Grove Atlantic through NetGalley.com.
Before long, this almost innocent occurrence gets tied to a harrowing tale of human trafficking, the Nigerian mafia and death. And for the first time in the series, Claudia Griffoni's home town becomes important - first when they meet someone else from the same place and then when not being from Venice makes it easier to figure out how to track down someone's history.
Usually in the series the Questura's detectives and policemen work on their own - they may leave Venice for the neighborhood towns but the stories tend to stay local. This time they get help both from the Carabinieri and the Coast Guard - despite starting in Venice and involving Venice citizens, the crime is a bit wider-scoped and there is a need for the special knowledge and skills of all the groups.
All that made this a different novel in a lot of ways but even with the differences, it is a Brunetti story - with the family and the HQ dynamics; with Venice's canals and tourists.
It is a post-COVID novel without being obvious about it - there are a few throw-away thoughts and utterances to tell you so (a thought about seeing what the city was without tourists, someone mentioning that they hoped that the cruise ships had all died and the thought about the retired doctors and nurses which came back to help despite knowing that their colleagues had died were the three I caught; there may have been more). Venice is almost back to normal but not completely. It may be a bit too early in the real world but I like how Leon handled the whole situation.
I liked this one more than I liked the previous one - even though it has a lot of us vs. them (some of it leading to Brunetti considering if he can even trust Claudia), it actually belonged in the novel - and the resolution of most of it should make it almost impossible to get back to the weirdness of it in the next novel. Or so one hopes.
Terribly disappointing.
Brunetti's nose takes him out of the streets of Venice, following some events that don't seem quite right to him. Why didn't the young men who took the American girls to the hospital stay there with them? Why did they abandon them? That scenario drives Brunetti's intuition, as he begins to wonder about one of the young men in particular, what he has to hide.
It is 4 years since I read one in this series, and I see that there are 3 titles that I have missed (which I must catch up with). There is some acknowledgement of the pandemic in this book, but not a lot. Mainly in the fact that there have been few tourist boats. The main characters are there, including Brunetti's family, but Brunetti himself seems a little tireder.
Most of the time, Brunetti must be satisfied with learning the truth rather than seeing justice served.
“Why would two young men dump two injured American girls outside a hospital in the middle of the night and then disappear? This is the question facing Commissario Guido Brunetti in a tricky
A truly outstanding title. The city of Venice, its inhabitants and culture is always at the forefront of this series. Guido, his fellow police officers, friends and family - all present intelligent, interesting, philosophies, logic and reasoning to all their ‘cases’ and interactions.
Brilliant *****