Take Död I Främmande Land (Commissario Brunetti, #2) Edited By Donna Leon Physical Book

second of the longrunning Brunetti series and here we see Leon introducing a more politicised element to her emotive storytelling: issues of the American army in Europe, of toxic waste and highlevel coverups merge with more domestic scenes in Venice.
Especially potent are the portraits of a Sicilian mother and her petty criminal son and the ambiguous activities of Brunettis own fatherinlaw,

Offsetting the darker elements are scenes of comedy in Brunettis ongoing feud with Patta, his boss and the wonderful warmth of his family life.
Nuanced and atmospheric, this is crime writing lit up with wit, intelligence, subtlety and humanity,
It is strangely comforting to read about corruption in Italy, in this annus horribilisin the USA,
And Leon's acidic description of Americans on the base in Vicenza is appropriate too, even though there are two Americans who do try to do the right thing, and another who is bamboozled by Americans in high places.

So many good characters in this one Maggiore Ambrogiani, who helps Brunetti and pays for it, The marvelous Signora Concetta and her feckless, ever hopeful son Ruffolo, The arrogantly viscous Viscardi. But perhaps the most delightful part is that Brunetti and his fatherinlaw, Count Orazio Falier, finally talk honestly and the class barriers between them tumble.


The Count: 'I care that these things happen, that we poison ourselves and our progeny, that we knowingly destroy our future, but I do not believe that there is anything and I repeat, anything that can be done to prevent it.
We are a nation of egoists, It is our glory, but it will be our destruction, for none of us can be made to concern ourselves about something as abstract as "the common good.
" The best of us can rise to feeling concern for our families, but as a nation, we are incapable of more, '

Of course Brunetti doesn't believe this, and neither does Paola, as Orazio acknowledges: "That is perhaps the finest thing I have achieved in my life, that my daughter does not share my beliefs.
"

Yet "Brunetti took his rage home with him, and it sat between him and his family as he ate, " It is only satisfied by the rage of another, more powerful, it turns out, than the Count with his millions and his contacts in high places.
But no spoilers DEATH IN A STRANGE COUNTRY Police ProcedGuido BrunettiItalyCont G
Leon, Donnand in series
A Penguin/Grove Press Book,, UK Paperback ISBN:

First Sentence: A body floated face down in the murky water of the canal.


At first, it appears to be a mugging gone wrong, But the knifed body of a young man found floating in the canal turns out to be an American soldier in the Office of Public Hearth from the American base in Vincenza.
It soon becomes clear to Comm, Guide Brunetti that more is going on than it first seemed, Brunetti finds cocaine planted in the soldiers apartment and his commanding officer, and lover, is found dead of a declared suicide, Not his only case three priceless paintings have been stolen from the palazzo in Venice of a wealthy Milanese who is connected to the Mafia.
Brunetti believes it was an insurance scam and thinks he knows one of the robbers involved, Proving it is something else,

Leons descriptions of Venice, and the surrealism to an Italian being on an American military base were wonderful, The interaction of Brunette with his family and fellow officers is so well done, The plot was intricate and well done but the ending was abrupt, I must say, however, the ending was appropriately unsatisfying and you felt Brunettis frustration, This wasnt my favorite Leon but she is still a wonderful writer,
Donna Leon's books quite simply inhabit Venice, Those of us who know it only superficially find it easy to recognise and by the end feel we understand the city and its customs and hidden corners a little better.
If we have never dropped in at that little bar for a coffee and a brioche, we can be sure we will spot it next time and not pass by.


The crime, of course, is intriguing enough to keep the reader turning pages but the pleasure is the setting in which it is wrapped: the place and the people.
Above all, the people. Commissario Brunetti has few rivals in detective fiction for the way in which his character emerges through myriad small details, The reader sees him at work and at home, with strengths and weaknesses in both, but they are indivisible halves of the same man, If one were the victim of a crime, one would be fortunate indeed to have Brunetti on the case,

The Commissario alone would guarantee Donna Leon's rightful place among the best of her peers, but there are other subtle virtues not to be overlooked.
In passing, Death in a Strange Country airs thoughtful views on immigration, on corruption, and on polution of the planet, And all this with a beautifully understated sense of humour,

At one point, Paola Brunetti makes a risotto for her husband, "He took two forkfuls, sighed in appreciation, and continued to eat, . . Paola saw that he had passed beyond the point of hunger and was eating for the pleasure of the act, . . " Contemplating the long list of Donna Leon's other titles, one experiences a similar sensation, I continue to be an enormous fan of the Commisario Brunetti series, For those of you who may have missed my earlier reviews, Donna Leon teaches English for the University of Maryland Extension near Venice and has lived in Italy for many years.
She portrays the flavor of Italian life vividly, and it's clear that while she must love living there, petty and notsopetty corruption is rampant, She makes delightfully wicked little comments, For example, the Carabineri major, interviewed by Brunetti on an American army post not base, that's for the Air Force waxes on about the characteristics of Americans.
They tend to be arrogant, of course, but Americans are really too insecure to be truly arrogant, "unlike the Germans, " Classic.

Brunetti is walking home through "battalions of ravaging tourists who centered their attacks on the area around San Marcos, Each year it grew harder to have patience with them, to put up with their stopandgo walking, with their insistence on walking three abreast through even the narrowest calles.
There were times when he wanted to scream at them, even push them aside, but he contented himself by taking out all of his aggressions through the single expedient of refusing to stop, or in any way alter his course, in order to allow them a photo opportunity.
Because of this, he was sure that his body, back and elbow appeared in hundreds of photos and videos, He sometimes contemplated the disappointed Germans looking at their summer videos during the violence of the North Sea storm as they watched a purposeful, darksuited Italian walk in front of Tante Gerda or an Onkel Franz, blurring, if only for a moment the lederhosenclad tourists" with what was probably the only real Italian they would see during their stay.


An American soldier, Sgt, Michael Foster, an American public health inspector at the American military hospital in Vicenza, has been found floating in one of the Venetian canals, In an act of true heroism, two policemen jump in the water the water being so dirty, hence the heroism and drag him out, Brunetti's superior would like nothing better than to have the case buried, because the idea of an American being killed in Venice would ruin the tourist trade.
Brunetti purposefully manipulates his boss into thinking the murder might have been committed elsewhere must think of tourism, of course so he can be authorized to travel to the man's post and investigate.
An army captain, Dr. Peters, a woman doctor, who had come to Venice to identify the body in the morgue, had vomited from what Brunetti thought was from fear, when she saw how the man had been killed, by a knife plunging directly through the ribs into the heart.
He suspects something is rather odd about this case, especially when he finds some cocaine that was not well hidden in the dead soldier's apartment, apparently after it had been thoroughly searched by the military authorities.
The case becomes more complicated as both he and the Carabinieri major are politely warned off the case after they discover a connection between the dead soldier, a sick boy, contracts for the disposal of toxic waste, Brunetti's fatherinlaw, and the ostensible suicide by heroin overdose of Dr.
Peters, not to mention the theft of some famous paintings from a prominent businessman,

As with many of her other books, you are left at the end deeply saddened by the corruption, the illicit use of power and its effect on Brunetti, who, despite all, struggles on trying to stay an honest cop.
He is a wonderful character, Slecht geschreven i do not care for it I'm really enjoying the Commissario Brunetti series, This book pulls together cultural differences between Italians and Americans and the intricate relationships Brunetti has with his superior, his family, and his fatherinlaw, Count Orazio Falier.
The environmental issues do not portray either Italy, Germany, or America in a good light, Venice is a supporting character and beautifully described, Bookand I am loving this series set in Venice, Very good plot and characters you quickly get to know and enjoy, Here we have a murder of a US Armed Forces soldier in Venice, and who is stationed in Vincenza which is over an hour away.
Brunetti is called upon to investigate this crime and along the way another person dies on the base in Vicenza, We also have some other crimes involving the mugging of an important businessman from Milan who was staying at his Venice apartment, and we have the theft of valuable paintings.
Really well done, having visited Venice and Italy on numerous occasions the description of the city, the politics, graft, etc, are spot on. And the ending leaves you, as Brunetti feeling that justice has been served! Onlymore books to go in this series!!! Reading thisin the series when I have already readother Guido Brunetti it was hard to star it.
I was perplexed betweenandstars, It's.stars, to be fair.

The problem is this, for me, Brunettiholds more background information and conversations between characters I've already learned to know in far greater nuance, Informative as that was, it often was too formal in an exposure style to the wellknown Brunetti kin and relatives, those especially, And often lacked the sublime dichotomy of wit in his answers to authority Patta and his cronies that becomes superlative of degree later on in the series.


But I have to add, Donna Leon has accomplished personality progression and relationship depth as she has built upon and built upon over all these novels, Because here Guido is not as maturely kind nor does he hold the depths to FULL knowledge of the "unfair" as he seems to hold later in the series.
The full sympathetico that he owns and uses so well in the last ten books, for instance, One of his best qualities is strength in the knowledge of how high the levels of corruption and inequality to result actually are in his Italian sphere.


Here his chore within investigating Foster's murder when he encounters Dr, Peters! You see the budding skills of Guido's inquiry but NOT with abrupt, cold questioning and accusation to inference, Instead you see the beginnings of how he investigates too by what he "doesn't" accuse, And moreover by what his eyes tell him is so,

This mystery had a diffuse and noncompleted to usual police case for duo murder ending, IMHO, There really was not justice in any civilized or lawful dictation method, So it does truly set the stage for so much of the reality of "case closed" in the future Venetian fallouts to crime,

This one also gets preachy, condescending, and at times "sideissue" noncohesive, But that's this genre and especially this locale reality, And of course, Paola is no small factor there either, The Count is portrayed within his real power to influence here too, considerable but not in any way overriding to the whole piece of his society.
He definitely is fearing certain names in association, as well, But his fear's reaction is also completely different, IMHO, He associates and keeps the enemies close, Very Machiavellian.

My favorites of the series are much later, but returning to these was still an excellent exercise, Donna Leon can slowly open a can of worms and let you think you are eating delicious clams, So lastly, the food! Some good meals here, especially the zucca risotto but all that dissing the American forms of food and lodging choices offset my enjoyment of it.


This one was much sadder than most of the Brunetti, Sadder even within the home family itself, It seems he didn't even want to walk thesets of stairs to the flat, at times, And I DID note a real crunch of fleeting reserve in the parental, Guido is NOT as amazed and joyful at the maturing of the kids as Paola seems to be, So Raffi has a girlfriend And his little girl is! Guido seems to feel the fleeting passage of the small years in a very melancholy miasma.
I recognize it.

OH I ALMOST FORGOT! I liked the casino experience and the comparisons to Las Vegas and gambling styles, That was a.star. And was incredibly glad that Guido'scame up and he can buy the computer and that new Raffi suit, And maybe even go to the mountains in January to ski, An American in Venice
the Grove Press paperback editionof the Harper Collins hardcover original

I am continuing to enjoy the Brunetti series, especially for the Venice atmosphere created by writer Donna Leon, who lived in the city foryears until retiring recently to a small village in Switzerland.
Death in a Strange Country finds Brunetti investigating the death of an American serviceman whose body is found in the canals of Venice.
Then a coworker from the same Health amp Safety unit at the American Army base dies as well, apparently as a suicide, Brunetti has to call in some extra help from his fatherinlaw Count Orazio Faller, Count Faller appears to have insider knowledge of not only the business world but also the criminal world of Italy, although his exact connections are kept vague, perhaps to be revealed further along in the series.


I enjoyed Death in a Strange Country for the different avenues of investigation followed by Brunetti and the continued views of his home life and his regular enjoyment of food and drink.
The conclusion was not quite completely satisfactory as you are left with the impression that the discovered corruption will carry on regardless, But it is likely true to life,


Actor Uwe Kocklisch as Commissario Guido Brunetti standing in front of sitelinkSt, Mark's Basilica in Venice, Italy in a film still from the German television adaptation of "Death in a Strange Country", Image sourced from sitelinkIMDB,

Trivia and Links
There is a really fascinating interview with author Donna Leon at sitelinkItalianMysteries, Com even if it was doneyears ago, She discusses all sorts of background to the books and characters and also gives the reason that she won't allow the books to be translated into Italian and it wasn't because she feared criticism by her neighbours in Venice.


Although it was thend book, Death in a Strange Country was filmed as theth episode "Endstation Venedig" Terminus Veniceof the German language TV seriesbased on the Donna Leon / Commissario Brunetti series.
That entire episode German language, no subtitles is available on YouTube sitelinkhere,

An English language summary of the German language Commissario Brunetti TV series is available at sitelinkFictional Cities Spoilers Obviously, As explained in the above interview, the TVseries was a German production as the books took off in popularity the most in the German speaking countries of Europe as Leon's publishing agent was SwissGerman and knew that market the best.
.