Through a Glass, Darkly
(Libby/OverDrive eAudiobook)

Leon's Guido Brunetti novels have been justly celebrated for their nuanced portrayal of Venice and their character-driven emphasis on human relationships. Both of those attributes are displayed nicely in her latest effort, the fifteenth in this long-running and much-loved series. When police commissario Brunetti and his assistant, Vianello, help out one of Vianello's friends, who has been arrested in an environmental protest, they find themselves embroiled in a family feud involving the friend's wife and her father, the owner of a centuries-old glass factory on the nearby island of Murano. No actual crime takes place until the novel is nearly half over, and even then, the death of a night watchman at the glass factory appears accidental. More than ever in this series, the emphasis here is not on mystery--the bad guy is obvious from the beginning--but on ambience and character. Leon delves deeply into the fascinating world of Murano glassmakers, and as always, she lingers lovingly over Brunetti's family life and the commissario's abiding empathy with everyone he encounters. Satisfying as always, but the lack of an engaging mystery plot leaves a bit of a hole this time. --Bill Ott Copyright 2006 Booklist

Last seen in Blood from a Stone (2005), Commissario Guido Brunetti investigates a murder on Murano, the famed island of glassmakers, in Leon's assured 15th mystery starring the cynical yet diligent Venetian policeman. Has a worker, found singed to death in front of a blazing furnace, been killed because of his environmental activism? Or is this a family feud between the factory's owner and his "green" engineer of a son-in-law? As usual, Leon educates the reader about the charms and corruptions of Italian life (the sensuality of the architecture and food, the indolence and stagnation of its bureaucracies), besides presenting a crash course in 21st-century glass-making. Every character, every line of dialogue, every descriptive passage rings true in a whodunit that's also travel essay, political commentary and existential monologue. And the middle-aged, happily married Brunetti remains unique-an everyman who's also extraordinary: "During his early years as a policeman... people still argued about whether it was right or wrong to use force during an interrogation.... Now they argued about how much pain they could inflict." (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Springtime in Venice calls for family scandals and the intervention of Commissario Guido Brunetti in his eighth case. Leon lives in Venice. A 50,000 first printing. Five-city author tour. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Commissario Guido Brunetti's 15th adventure takes him to a Venetian glassworks where murder is the sordid by-product of beautifully blown baubles. The case begins quietly enough. Inspector Lorenzo Vianello's friend, ecologist Marco Ribetti, has been arrested during a protest at his father-in-law Giovanni De Cal's fornace on Sacca Serenella. When Brunetti and Vianello persuade the Murano Questura to turn Ribetti loose, De Cal is waiting on the steps outside to abuse his son-in-law, who he's convinced married his daughter only for her money. Seeking witnesses who heard De Cal threaten Ribetti, Brunetti is directed to night watchman Giorgio Tassini, who's recently left De Cal's employ and gone to work for the neighboring establishment Gianluca Fasano, a major player with political ambitions. But Brunetti's investigation into De Cal's threats is derailed by Tassini's sudden, horrible death from a heat-induced heart attack while he was lying unconscious just outside the fornace. Fans of Leon's suavely understated series will expect revelations of corruption that reaches much further out and higher up--perhaps even higher than Brunetti's vain, incompetent superior, Vice-Questore Giuseppe Patta, now angling for a job with Interpol--and they won't be disappointed. Even if the path from misdemeanors to monstrous felonies is less inevitable than in Brunetti's best (Blood from a Stone, 2005), Leon shows once more why she has no serious rivals in the art of unfolding mysteries in which the killer's identity is the least interesting detail. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Leon's Guido Brunetti novels have been justly celebrated for their nuanced portrayal of Venice and their character-driven emphasis on human relationships. Both of those attributes are displayed nicely in her latest effort, the fifteenth in this long-running and much-loved series. When police commissario Brunetti and his assistant, Vianello, help out one of Vianello's friends, who has been arrested in an environmental protest, they find themselves embroiled in a family feud involving the friend's wife and her father, the owner of a centuries-old glass factory on the nearby island of Murano. No actual crime takes place until the novel is nearly half over, and even then, the death of a night watchman at the glass factory appears accidental. More than ever in this series, the emphasis here is not on mystery--the bad guy is obvious from the beginning--but on ambience and character. Leon delves deeply into the fascinating world of Murano glassmakers, and as always, she lingers lovingly over Brunetti's family life and the commissario's abiding empathy with everyone he encounters. Satisfying as always, but the lack of an engaging mystery plot leaves a bit of a hole this time. ((Reviewed March 1, 2006)) Copyright 2006 Booklist Reviews.

Springtime in Venice calls for family scandals and the intervention of Commissario Guido Brunetti in his eighth case. Leon lives in Venice. A 50,000 first printing. Five-city author tour. Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

The Venice of Leon's (Dressed for Death ) series featuring police Commissario Guido Brunetti, also the author's home for decades, has been called a city not known to tourists and not recommended by travel agents, a charge never more appropriate than in this novel. Here family acrimony involving a glass factory draws Brunetti into the issue of pollution and, possibly, murder. When a night watchman who had long blamed the factory's toxic chemicals for his daughter's birth defects is found dead at work, Brunetti is suspicious, even though medical records attribute the child's problems to difficulty during home birthing. What he finds delights his supervisor, the sycophantic Vice Questore Patta, for reasons that leave Brunetti speechless, then discouraged, before a closing serendipitous discovery. As usual, Brunetti's wife and children and the obvious pleasure they take in one another's company add a warm human dimension. Yet the broader environmental concerns raised by the petrochemical complex at Porto Marghera, across the lagoon from Venice, loom even on lovely spring days. An extremely satisfying addition to this superior series. [See Prepub Mystery, LJ 1/06.]--Michele Leber, Arlington, VA

Last seen in Blood from a Stone (2005), Commissario Guido Brunetti investigates a murder on Murano, the famed island of glassmakers, in Leon's assured 15th mystery starring the cynical yet diligent Venetian policeman. Has a worker, found singed to death in front of a blazing furnace, been killed because of his environmental activism? Or is this a family feud between the factory's owner and his "green" engineer of a son-in-law? As usual, Leon educates the reader about the charms and corruptions of Italian life (the sensuality of the architecture and food, the indolence and stagnation of its bureaucracies), besides presenting a crash course in 21st-century glass-making. Every character, every line of dialogue, every descriptive passage rings true in a whodunit that's also travel essay, political commentary and existential monologue. And the middle-aged, happily married Brunetti remains unique--an everyman who's also extraordinary: "During his early years as a policeman... people still argued about whether it was right or wrong to use force during an interrogation.... Now they argued about how much pain they could inflict." (May)