In Search of the Seven Deadly Sins
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Early in Doctored Evidence, Commissario Guido Brunetti asks his wife, Paola, about a book she is reading . . . a text on religion that has been assigned to their daughter, Chiara. They muse about the seven deadly sins and speculate about whether or not anyone takes those sins seriously any more. During his case, Brunetti assumes that only certain sins can be motive enough for murder. Is he right?
As the story opens, Signora Battestini has been bludgeoned to death by someone strong. She's an old lady who never leaves her apartment, but nothing has been taken. A missing housekeeper seems worth tracking down by Lieutenant Scarpa, one of Vice-Questore Patta's enforcers. In the process of arresting her, a terrible accident takes place. Scarpa and Patta are satisfied that the housekeeper is the killer, and the case goes dormant. Brunetti is away on vacation at the time.
All might have stayed that way, but a neighbor comes to report that the housekeeper is probably innocent. Scarpa tries to get rid of the neighbor, but Brunetti ends up involved. From there, the real investigation begins.
One of the most interesting parts of this story is when Dona Leon fills in some background by Signorina Elletra Zorzi and her seemingly magical ability to access records that shouldn't be available to her. You'll be astonished by the contrast between her personal scruples and her unscrupulous methods for gaining police information.
Brunetti also gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar after doing some illegal searching. How will he handle the potential for exposure and discipline?
The mystery in this book is pretty good. It will be some time before you'll be able to figure out who the murderer is and the motive. The ultimate explanation was credible and added to the pedestrian tone of dealing with the minor and major annoyances of life:
How should you persuade the neighbors to make less noise at night?
How can an exploited housekeeper with questionable papers protect herself from exploitation?
How should a threat to respectability be met?
How can endless official delays be overcome?
Take a ride on the #1 Vaporetto if it's not crowded and enjoy the sights and sounds of Venice (I wouldn't dare suggest you try to enjoy the odors of Venice).
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dreadful
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I was given this book by someone whose first language is not English, with the explaination that it was too difficult for her to read. I had assumed that the reason was that the vocabulary was too challenging; but, no ... it is just so excruciatingly poorly written. Is this a translation from Italian (no mention in the blurb) or was it written in English?
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My least favourite
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Having read and loved nearly all of Donna Leon's novels I'm afraid I have to say how disappointing I found Doctored Evidence. For the first time I found the construction of some of her sentences clumsy and I had to keep rereading them to get the gist. Much as I love Brunetti and his family again, for the first time, I found his wife Paola's rants irritating. As far as the plot goes, none of the characters were fully developed or of any interest and when it came to the grand finale I struggled to remember who the suspect was and didn't really care. As part of the investigation into the old woman's death, Brunetti tries to find out about her son who had died five years previously, but nobody seemed to know anything about him or people clammed up at mention of his name. Because he had died of Aids did not really account for this sort of reaction and was really a poor "red herring" in the story as it was implausible that no-one knew anything about him in a tiny community like Venice, when in her other books we are to believe that everybody knows everything about everyone, you only had to ask. As a Leon fan I was truly disappointed but have moved straight on to Uniform Justice and am instantly gripped and back at home with the truly human Commissario Guido Brunetti, a man I wish was real and that I knew.
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Storyline OK; language unpolished
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Sadly, I cannot share other reviewers' unbridled enthusiasm for this book. The storyline is fairly intriguing, and probably quite realistic. What disappointed me was the lack of "polish and fluidity" in the writing with the occasional jarringly awkward construction. Indeed I suspect the author is not a native english speaker. The story does conjure up a plausible image of what living in Italy means: the summer heat, certain aspects of the national character (e.g. willingness to bend rules). A refreshing aspect is the "humanness" of the main character Brunetti: he did not appear to be of infallible, superhuman intelligence; he was not a fount of obscure but crucial information. In summary: if you don't mind the slightly awkward language, you'll probably enjoy it. I preferred "Dissolution" by Sansom (a murder mystery set in England in the reign of Henry VIII).
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Leon is RX for a great read!
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It's more than a "lucky 13" for Donna Leon. "Doctored Evidence" is acarefully-crafted, purposefully-written, and fully-fulfilling (typical!)Leon police procedural featuring my favorite Italian, Commissario GuidoBrunetti.
The erstwhile policeman has been on holiday to Ireland when the deathoccurs (A Romanian cleaning woman supposedly murdered her employer andmade off with a large sum of money, only to be apprehended at a bordercrossing; before police can take her into custody, she bolts and is killedby an on-coming train)and when he returns he has already dismissed thecase, which he'd read about in the papers, as merely a "cut and dried"episode in the life of the police in Venice.
Of course, the death of the cleaning woman has suspicious and unusualcircumstances and shortly after Brunetti returns to work, a neighbor ofthe dead woman reports to the police that she has proof that the woman isinnocent. This, of course, really peaks Brunetti's interest and from thatpoint on, Donna Leon is, well, Donna Leon.
Before the case is closed, of course, readers once again witness theinter-play between Brunetti and his associates, his family, and hisbeloved Venice. Leon is not shy about taking literary pot shots at anumber of socially significant issues facing not only the Venezians, theItalians, but the rest of the world.
Step by step, Leon takes us to the conclusion, where, of course it's nosecret, Brunetti's intellect, talent, and good will once more triumph.
"Doctored Evidence" continues the Leon reputation. What a fascinatingseries Leon has created. Tis a pity one has to wait a year for the nextepisode.
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