Trace Elements (Guido Brunetti Series #29)

Trace Elements (Guido Brunetti Series #29)

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  • Type：Epub+TxT+PDF+Mobi
  • Create Date：2020-03-05 04:10:22
  • Update Date：2025-09-06
  • Status：finish
  • Author：Donna Leon
  • Environment：PC/Android/iPhone/iPad/Kindle

Editor Reviews

01/27/2020

At the start of bestseller Leon’s thought-provoking 29th mystery featuring Venetian Commissario Guido Brunetti (after 2019’s Unto Us a Son Is Given), Brunetti and his colleague, Commissario Claudia Griffoni, are called to a hospice at the request of 38-year-old Benedetta Toso, who’s dying of cancer. Though Benedetta isn’t fully lucid, Brunetti and Griffoni learn that she suspects foul play in the recent death of her husband, Vittorio Fadalto, a water distribution technician employed by the firm Spattuto Acqua. Vittorio drowned when his motorcycle went off the road, yet he had a reputation for careful behavior when it came to safety. His wife hints that Vittorio was involved in something dishonest, and the expert online sleuthing by a colleague of Brunetti’s uncovers disturbing financial transactions. Brunetti sets out to examine employee activities at Spattuto Acqua, which is charged with maintaining the integrity of Venice’s water supply. As usual, Leon adroitly portrays the complex questions of what constitutes justice and the sad consequences that can result from its pursuit. This long-running series shows no sign of losing steam. Agent: Susanne Bauknecht, Diogenes Verlag (Switzerland). (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

Reviews

Anonymous ，

Where I live, the weather is currently cold and the days are short. When Trace Elements takes place during a summer in Venice, it is as hot as hot can be. Clothes are sticking, meals need to be light and our detective, Guido Brunetti is mystified by the tourists who want to be in Venice at this miserable time. I could feel the heat and the need to drink mineral water. All of this is to say that Ms. Leon is a master at creating her scenes and characters. When Brunetti was eating his cheese and salad, I salivated. When I followed this essentially good man throughout the story, I wanted to know him and his colleagues as real people. When Brunetti was with his wife, Paola, I wanted a marriage like theirs. All of this adds verisimilitude to a novel that, in parts, is deeply tragic. Tue story begins when Brunetti and a female colleague go to visit Benedetta, a women in hospice care, who is dying a miserable death from cancer. Readers will feel great sympathy for this character's suffering. Before she dies, Benedetta presents Brunetti and Claudia Griffoni with something to investigate. They learn that Benedetta's daughters are about to become orphans as Benedetta's husband recently died in a crash. Was his death an accident? If it was murder how, if at all, does it relate to his job? In Trace Elements (an apt title), the crime as it relates to Venice feels all too plausible. Ms. Leon has done her research and written a believable and sad tale of human corruption and its consequences. Wrong actions happen but the reasons for them differ. This title is the latest entry in Donna Leon's long running series about Guido Brunetti. It is a most excellent novel and I recommend it highly.

LyndaZ ，

There's something fishy about the Venetian water system and a young woman on her deathbed feels the need to bring it to Commissario Brunetti's attention. Overall, I found Leon's 29th installment a pretty good mystery with a few red herrings thrown in to keep readers on their toes. Jaded? Brunetti? Yeah, seems the years have shown him some all to true facts about the judicial system and acts, for him, accordingly. The conclusion, in my opinion, was rather lackluster but, still, who doesn't enjoy a trip through the streets and canals of Venice with Brunetti and company. Thank you NetGalley, Leon and her publishers for granting me approval to read this ARC. #TraceElements #NetGalley

Tangen ，

aw-enforcement, murder-investigation, Venice, eco-awareness, international-crime-and-mystery, family Comissario Brunetti is more introspective than some, and that is what drives him to investigate an apparent fatal vehicle accident at the request of a young woman as she lay dying in hospice. Brunetti works in Venice where the traffic is as crazy as any big city with busses, police transport, multinational tourists, and pickpockets despite being at sea level and depending upon the canals. It's summer and the heat is abominable between the thermometer and the sunshine reflecting off the water, but the dress code must be maintained. I'm purposely not recapping the story and trying to avoid spoilers, but I sat up too late reading it, so that should tell a thing or two. The story is as convoluted and timely as reading Euronews or any major newspaper and, like the news, leaves some personal issues unfinished (just like the only other one I had the chance to read). Excellent! I requested and received a free ebook copy from Grove Atlantic/Atlantic Monthly Press via NetGalley. Thank you!