Good Reads / Community Library Notes
The Temptation of Forgiveness
Donna Leon
Review by Priscilla Comen
The Temptation of Forgiveness
Donna Leon
Review by Priscilla Comen
The Temptation of Forgiveness, by Donna Leon, is the most recent of Leon’s wonderful stories about Commissario Guido Brunetti in beautiful, mysterious Venice, Italy. A woman friend of Brunetti’s wife comes to see the Commissario about her son whom she suspects is using drugs. When her husband is found unconscious on the bridge near their apartment, Brunetti rushes to the scene. Griffoni, his female assistant, meets him there.
When the husband is taken to the hospital, Brunetti calls the man’s wife and questions her when she arrives. Why did her husband leave the house at night? Where is her son? Author Leon has Brunetti take the vaporetta taxi to police headquarters then buy a brioche and a café in the afternoon. She shows us Italian customs through his actions. A map on the frontispiece shows us the way through Venice.
Brunetti goes to the hospital to encourage the wounded man’s wife to go home, to make things normal for her two children. As the two walk to her street along the Grand Canal, they notice and remark upon the new malls that stock tourist items made in China and things that local Venetians do not need. Where is the toy store? The sewing and knitting store? Venice has become a tourist town and the author Leon seems upset by this.
After they arrive at her home, her children are there and Guido is reminded of his two kids and how much he worries about them. Señora Elettra is the secretary who finds out everything with her computer and takes care of Guido. She reads Vogue magazine at her desk. She helps Brunetti find the drug dealer who is selling to the high school students. Brunetti goes to his home in a run-down part of Venice. He is dying of lung cancer, so Brunetti doesn’t say who he is, but leaves, feeling sympathy for the man and his wife.
Brunetti’s love of classic Shakespeare helps him solve the crime. Brunetti decides to check on pharmacists and doctors who prescribe expensive drugs instead of generic MEDs for patients with Alzheimer's or Parkinson’s diseases. The patients don’t realize they are paying more than they should. Brunetti goes to see Doctor Roberti to discuss her practice with elderly patients. She tells him about her son who is in an expensive care home for the mentally ill. She needs the money for his care.
Does Brunetti solve this crime? What happens to the man in the hospital and to the doctors and the pharmacist? Do Brunetti’s sympathies steer him in the direction of the law? Find this latest mystery by Leon on the new mystery shelf of your Mendocino Community Library.
When the husband is taken to the hospital, Brunetti calls the man’s wife and questions her when she arrives. Why did her husband leave the house at night? Where is her son? Author Leon has Brunetti take the vaporetta taxi to police headquarters then buy a brioche and a café in the afternoon. She shows us Italian customs through his actions. A map on the frontispiece shows us the way through Venice.
Brunetti goes to the hospital to encourage the wounded man’s wife to go home, to make things normal for her two children. As the two walk to her street along the Grand Canal, they notice and remark upon the new malls that stock tourist items made in China and things that local Venetians do not need. Where is the toy store? The sewing and knitting store? Venice has become a tourist town and the author Leon seems upset by this.
After they arrive at her home, her children are there and Guido is reminded of his two kids and how much he worries about them. Señora Elettra is the secretary who finds out everything with her computer and takes care of Guido. She reads Vogue magazine at her desk. She helps Brunetti find the drug dealer who is selling to the high school students. Brunetti goes to his home in a run-down part of Venice. He is dying of lung cancer, so Brunetti doesn’t say who he is, but leaves, feeling sympathy for the man and his wife.
Brunetti’s love of classic Shakespeare helps him solve the crime. Brunetti decides to check on pharmacists and doctors who prescribe expensive drugs instead of generic MEDs for patients with Alzheimer's or Parkinson’s diseases. The patients don’t realize they are paying more than they should. Brunetti goes to see Doctor Roberti to discuss her practice with elderly patients. She tells him about her son who is in an expensive care home for the mentally ill. She needs the money for his care.
Does Brunetti solve this crime? What happens to the man in the hospital and to the doctors and the pharmacist? Do Brunetti’s sympathies steer him in the direction of the law? Find this latest mystery by Leon on the new mystery shelf of your Mendocino Community Library.