Search query: donna leon books brunetti series chronological order

Product: Through a Glass, Darkly (Commissario Brunetti Book 15)
Description: A New York Times–bestselling series: A murder mystery set on Italy’s secretive island of Murano, renowned for its world-famous glass.

On a luminous spring day in Venice, Commissario Brunetti and his assistant play hooky from work to help a friend, Marco Ribetti, arrested during an environmental protest. They secure his release, only to be faced by the fury of the man’s father-in-law, Giovanni De Cal, a cantankerous glass factory owner who has been heard in the bars of Murano making violent threats about Ribetti.

Brunetti’s curiosity is piqued, and he finds himself drawn to Murano to investigate. Is De Cal the type of man to carry out his threats? Then one morning the body of De Cal’s night watchman is found. Over long lunches, on secret boat rides, in quiet bars, and down narrow streets, Brunetti searches for the killer . . .

“One of the best of the international crime writers.” —Rocky Mountain News

“[A] superlative series.” —The New York Times Book Review
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Product: Unto Us a Son Is Given (A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery Book 28)
Description: The New York Times bestseller: “Venice shines through the pages of this novel. . . . Coupled with unexpected twists and turns [it] doesn’t disappoint” (Tulsa Book Review).

A Los Angeles Times Bestseller • A Library Journal Mystery Bestseller • A Booklist Best Crime Novel of the Year • A Crime Reads Most Anticipated Book of the Year

Guido Brunetti is urged by his father-in-law to investigate—and preferably intervene in—the seemingly innocent plan of the elderly Gonzalo Rodríguez de Tejeda to adopt a much younger man as his son. Under Italian inheritance laws, this man would then be heir to Gonzalo’s entire fortune, a prospect Gonzalo’s friends find appalling. For his part, Brunetti wonders why the old man, a close family friend, can’t be allowed his pleasure in peace.

And yet, what seems innocent on the Venetian surface can cause tsunamis below. Gonzalo unexpectedly drops dead on the street, and one of his friends—who just arrived in Venice for the memorial service—is strangled in her hotel room. Now with an urgent case to solve, Brunetti reluctantly untangles the long-hidden mystery in Gonzalo’s life that has ultimately led to murder . . . a resolution that brings him more pain than satisfaction.

“Like Louise Penny, Leon has cultivated an utterly devoted audience, ever anxious to get to know more about her characters.” ―Booklist (starred review)

“Redolent, as always, with the sights, smells, sounds, and mealtimes of the water-immersed city. . . . In Leon’s latest, a pleasantly deceptive lull . . . is dissolved with deadly force.” ―The Seattle Review of Books
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Product: The Temptation of Forgiveness (Commissario Brunetti Book 27)
Description: The New York Times–bestselling series transports us to “Donna Leon’s enticing, troubled and beautiful Venice . . . Her latest mystery is one of her best” (Providence Journal).

A New York Times Book Review Best Crime Book of the Year • A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice • A Financial Times Summer Book Pick • A Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine Most Anticipated Mystery of the Year

Commissario Guido Brunetti is surprised by the appearance of a friend of his wife’s, fearful that her son is using drugs and hopeful Brunetti can somehow intervene. When the woman’s husband is found unconscious with a serious brain injury at the foot of a bridge in Venice after midnight, Brunetti is drawn to pursue a possible connection to the boy’s behavior. But the truth, as Brunetti has experienced so often, is not straightforward.

While Brunetti pursues several false and contradictory leads, he becomes exasperated by the petty bureaucracy that constantly bedevils him and threatens to expose Signorina Elettra, his superior’s secretary. But steadied by the embrace of his own family and by his passion for the classics, he reads Sophocles’s Antigone, and, in its light, considers the terrible consequences to which the actions of a tender heart can lead.

“It’s the living, bleeding humanity of the characters that makes Donna Leon’s police procedurals so engaging. . . . Tagging along after this sleuth is a wonderful way to see Venice like a native.” ―The New York Times Book Review

“[A] droll and intelligent series.” ―The Wall Street Journal

“[A] richly rewarding series . . . from a master of character-rich crime fiction.” ―Booklist
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Product: By its Cover (Commissario Brunetti Book 23)
Description: The peace of a Venice library is shattered by the murder of a patron in the New York Times–bestselling series starring “a superb police detective” (Library Journal).

A Seattle Times Best Mystery and Crime Novel of the Year

One afternoon, Commissario Guido Brunetti gets a frantic call from the director of a prestigious Venetian library. Someone has stolen pages out of several rare books. After a round of questioning, the case seems clear: the culprit must be the man who requested the volumes, an American professor from a Kansas university. The only problem—the man fled the library earlier that day, and after they check his credentials, it seems the American professor doesn’t exist.

As the investigation proceeds, the suspects multiply. And when a seemingly harmless theologian who’d spent years reading at the library turns up brutally murdered, Brunetti must question his expectations about what makes a man innocent or guilty.

“Leon offers a finely drawn tale that encompasses theft, blackmail, emotional violence, and murder, as well as a rich array of characters [and] compellingly combines their workaday crime-solving with a detailed picture of a vanishing Venice.” —The Boston Globe

“Above all, Brunetti is a careful reader, of people, of places, of situations, and he never stops at surface meanings. That’s why we bookish types adore him the way we do, and why this will likely be one of his most-loved adventures.” —Booklist, starred review
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Product: The Golden Egg (Commissario Brunetti Book 22)
Description: A New York Times bestseller: “Brunetti amply displays the keen intelligence and wry humor that has endeared this series to so many.” —Publishers Weekly

Commissario Brunetti’s latest assignment is to look into a minor shop-keeping violation committed by the mayor’s future daughter-in-law. Brunetti has no interest in helping his boss amass political favors, but has little choice but to comply. Then Brunetti’s wife comes to him with a request of her own. The sweet, simple-minded man who worked at their dry cleaner has just died of a sleeping pill overdose, and Paola loathes the idea that he lived and died without anyone noticing him, or helping him.

Brunetti begins to investigate and is surprised when he finds nothing on the man: no birth certificate, no passport, no driver’s license, no credit cards. As far as the Italian government is concerned, he never existed. Stranger still, the dead man’s mother refuses to speak to the police. And as secrets unravel, Brunetti begins to suspect that an aristocratic family might be somehow connected to the mystery . . .

“Leon’s success . . . is testament to the heartening fact that character counts in crime fiction.” —Booklist, starred review
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Product: Uniform Justice (Commissario Brunetti Book 12)
Description: A wall of silence surrounds a cadet’s death at an elite military academy: “Superb . . . This is an outstanding book.” —Publishers Weekly

Detective Commissario Guido Brunetti has been called to investigate a parent’s worst nightmare. A young cadet has been found hanged, a presumed suicide, in Venice’s elite military academy.

Brunetti’s sorrow for the boy, so close in age to his own son, is rivaled only by his contempt for a community that is more concerned with protecting the reputation of the school, and its privileged students, than understanding this tragedy. The young man is the son of a doctor and former politician—a man of impeccable integrity, all too rare in politics. Dr. Moro is clearly devastated; but while both he and his apparently estranged wife seem convinced that the boy’s death could not have been suicide, neither appears eager to talk to the police or involve Brunetti in any investigation of the circumstances in which he died.

As Brunetti pursues his inquiry, he is faced with a wall of silence. Is the military protecting its own? And what of the other witnesses? Is this the natural reluctance of Italians to involve themselves with the authorities, or is Brunetti facing a conspiracy far greater than this one death?

“Brunetti is a compelling character, a good man trying to stay on the honest path in a devious and twisted world.” —The Baltimore Sun
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Product: Trace Elements (A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery Book 29)
Description: The New York Times–bestselling author of Unto Us a Son Is Given continues “one of the most exquisite and subtle detective series ever” (The Washington Post).

When a dying hospice patient gasps that her husband was murdered over “bad money,” Commissario Brunetti softly promises he and his colleague, Claudia Griffoni, will look into what initially appears to be a private family tragedy. They discover that the man had worked in the field, collecting samples of contamination for a company that measures the cleanliness of Venice’s water supply, and that he had recently died in a mysterious motorcycle accident. Piecing together the tangled threads, Brunetti comes to realize the perilous meaning in the woman’s accusation and the threat it reveals to the health of the entire region. But justice in this case proves to be ambiguous, as Brunetti is reminded it can be when he reads Aeschylus’s classic play The Eumenides.

Praise for Donna Leon’s Commissario Brunetti Mysteries

“[Leon] has never become perfunctory, never failed to give us vivid portraits of people and of Venice, never lost her fine, disillusioned indignation.” —Ursula K. LeGuin, author of Dancing at the Edge of the World

“You become so wrapped up in these compelling characters. . . . Each one is better than the last.” —Louise Erdrich, winner of the National Book Award for Fiction

“Leon’s Venetian mysteries never disappoint, calling up the romantic sights and sounds of La Serenissima even as they acquaint us with the practical matters that concern the city’s residents.” —The New York Times Book Review

“The sophisticated but still moral Brunetti, with his love of food and his loving family, proves a worthy custodian of timeless values and verities.” —The Wall Street Journal
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Product: The Girl of His Dreams (Commissario Brunetti Book 17)
Description: Two detectives go undercover in Venice, Italy, in the New York Times–bestselling series by “the undisputed crime fiction queen” (The Baltimore Sun).

A priest recently returned from years of missionary work has made a personal request of Commissario Guido Brunetti—but the police detective suspects the man’s motives. A new, American-style Protestant sect has begun to meet in Venice, and it’s possible the priest is merely apprehensive of the competition. But the preacher could also be fleecing his growing flock, so Brunetti and Inspector Vianello, along with their wives, decide to go undercover. In the midst of the investigation, though, the body of a Gypsy child washes up in a canal—and Brunetti finds himself haunted by both the crime and the girl . . .

“No one knows the labyrinthine world of Venice or the way favoritism and corruption shape Italian life like Leon’s Brunetti . . . the thoughtful Venetian cop with a love of food, an outspoken wife, and a computer-hacker secretary.” —Time

“Gorgeously written.” —The New York Times Book Review
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Product: Dressed for Death (Commissario Brunetti Book 3)
Description: The New York Times–bestselling series and its Italian detective explore the seedy underworld of Venice: “Procedural writing at its best” (The Washington Post).

Commissario Guido Brunetti’s hopes for a refreshing family holiday in the mountains are once again dashed when a gruesome discovery is made in Marghera—a body so badly beaten the face is completely unrecognizable. Brunetti searches Venice for someone who can identify the corpse but is met with a wall of silence. He then receives a telephone call from a contact who promises some tantalizing information. And before the night is out, Brunetti is confronting yet another appalling, and apparently senseless, death.

“[One of] the real charms of this series [is] the endearing character of Brunetti and his compassionate insights into the heart of Venice and the soul of its people. . . . Truly, a refreshing hero.” —The New York Times Book Review

“Despite the gruesome way in which this murder, and subsequent ones, take place, it’s really a cheery, breezy mystery, filled with good humor and adventure. The ending can only leave the reader waiting avidly for the next time we meet Brunetti and his lively friends and cohorts.” —Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

“Leon delivers her plot in an unassuming, graceful and beautifully paced prose that hides its measured elegance.” —The Washington Post

“One of the most appealing of recent detectives, Brunetti stars in a case that brings out his canniness and his compassion—and shows his creator spreading her wings more powerfully than ever.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Richly evocative. . . . Venice takes on a deep noir tint in Leon’s latest well-crafted work.” —Publishers Weekly
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Product: Quietly in Their Sleep (Commissario Brunetti Book 6)
Description: A nun has left her convent after a series of suspicious deaths: “Leon’s novels are always a pleasure.” —The Washington Post

In Venice, Italy, Commissario Guido Brunetti comes to the aid of a young Catholic sister, who has left her convent after five of her nursing home patients died unexpectedly. In the course of his inquiries, Brunetti encounters an unusual cast of characters, but discovers nothing that seems criminal. The police detective must determine whether the nun is simply creating a smoke screen to justify abandoning her vocation—or if she has stumbled onto something very real and very sinister that places her own life in imminent danger.

“Leon’s books shimmer in the grace of their setting and are warmed by the charm of their characters.” —The New York Times Book Review

Also published under the title The Death of Faith
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Product: Acqua Alta (Commissario Brunetti Book 5)
Description: “A dramatic and deeply satisfying climax . . . a high-stakes mystery in which the setting vibrates with as much life as the story itself.” —Publishers Weekly

As Venice braces for a winter tempest, intrepid Italian sleuth Commissario Guido Brunetti finds out that an archaeologist and old friend has been savagely beaten at the palazzo home of opera singer Flavia Petrelli.

Then, as the floodwaters rise, the corpse of a museum director is discovered—and Brunetti must wade through the chaotic city to solve his deadliest case yet.

“An evocative peep into the dark underworld of the beauteous city.” —Time Out London

“A superb police detective.” —Library Journal

Also published under the title Death in High Water
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Product: A Sea of Troubles (Commissario Brunetti Book 10)
Description: An Italian police detective looks into the deaths of two fishermen in an isolated island community: “Leon’s Venetian mysteries never disappoint.” —The New York Times Book Review

On a beautiful spring morning on the island of Pellestrina, south of the Lido on the Venetian lagoon, a small boat moored at the docks suddenly explodes, killing two local clam fishermen. When it becomes clear that the fire was deliberately set, Brunetti decides to investigate. But when he tries to dig up information about the murder, the island’s tight-knit, closemouthed community closes ranks—forcing Brunetti to accept Signorina Elettra’s offer to visit her relatives there to search for clues.

On the island, Brunetti finds himself torn between his duty to solve the murders and his concerns for the Signorina’s safety. And though he is loyal to his beloved wife, Brunetti’s concern for his boss’s spirited secretary may be driven by more than platonic feeling . . .

“The arrival of a new Donna Leon book fills me with pleasurable anticipation. She tells a good story, including the best of all current police detectives, Commissario Brunetti, and locates it in a superbly described Venice. The plot is beautifully constructed. The climax is exciting and disturbing . . . Brunetti is as irresistible as ever.” —The Scotsman

“The sophisticated but still moral Brunetti, with his love of food and his loving family, proves a worthy custodian of timeless values and verities.” —TheWall Street Journal
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Product: Fatal Remedies (Commissario Brunetti Book 8)
Description: The Italian police detective’s latest case hits close to home, in this novel in the New York Times–bestselling series.

For Commissario Brunetti, it began with an early morning phone call. In the chill of the Venetian dawn, a sudden act of vandalism shatters the quiet of the deserted city. But Brunetti is shocked to find that the culprit waiting to be apprehended at the scene is someone from his own family.

Meanwhile, Brunetti is under pressure from his superiors to solve a daring robbery with a link to a suspicious accidental death. Does it all lead back to the Mafia? And how are his family’s actions connected to these crimes? The truth must be uncovered in this novel in the Silver Dagger Award–winning series by “one of the best of the international crime writers” (Rocky Mountain News).

“Leon’s devoted readers love her books for their juicy mystery plots, and also for the rich and varied cast of recurring characters, among which is the city of Venice itself.” —Publishers Weekly
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Product: Willful Behavior (Commissario Brunetti Book 11)
Description: In this “powerful” novel in the New York Times–bestselling series, an Italian police detective delves into two deaths and a dark era of history (The Times, London).

When Commissario Guido Brunetti first meets her, Claudia Leonardo is merely one of his wife’s students. Intelligent and serious, she asks for his help in obtaining a pardon for a crime once committed by her now-dead grandfather. Brunetti thinks little of it—until Claudia is found dead.

Unable to find any living relatives, he visits the elderly Austrian woman who was once Claudia’s grandfather’s lover and with whom Claudia was close—and is stunned by the extraordinary art collection she keeps in her otherwise modest apartment. When she, too, is murdered, Brunetti’s investigation uncovers shocking skeletons in the closet of Nazi collaboration that few in Italy want revealed . . .

“[A] widely admired series.” —Chicago Tribune

“The appeal of Guido Brunetti, the hero of Donna Leon’s long-running Venetian crime series, comes not from his shrewdness, though he is plenty shrewd, nor from his quick wit. It comes, instead, from his role as an Everyman . . . [his life is] not so different from our own days at the office or nights around the dinner table. Crime fiction for those willing to grapple with, rather than escape, the uncertainties of daily life.” —Booklist
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Product: Death at La Fenice (Commissario Brunetti Book 1)
Description: A conductor succumbs to cyanide at the famed Venice opera house, in the first mystery in the New York Times–bestselling, award-winning series.

During intermission at the famed La Fenice opera house in Venice, Italy, a notoriously difficult and widely disliked German conductor is poisoned—and suspects abound. Guido Brunetti, a native Venetian, sets out to unravel the mystery behind the high-profile murder. To do so, he calls on his knowledge of Venice, its culture, and its dirty politics. Along the way, he finds the crime may have roots going back decades—and that revenge, corruption, and even Italian cuisine may play a role.

“One of the most exquisite and subtle detective series ever.” —The Washington Post

“A brilliant writer . . . an immensely likable police detective who takes every murder to heart.” —The New York Times Book Review
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Product: Death and Judgment (Commissario Brunetti Book 4)
Description: Venice’s Commissario Brunetti takes on his “most difficult and politically sensitive case to date” in the gripping New York Times–bestselling series (Booklist).

In Death and Judgment, a truck crashes and spills its dangerous cargo on a treacherous road in the Italian Dolomite mountains. Meanwhile, in Santa Lucia, a prominent international lawyer is found dead aboard an intercity train. Suspecting a connection between the two tragedies, Brunetti digs deep for an answer, stumbling upon a seedy Venetian bar that holds the key to a crime network that reaches far beyond the laguna. But it will take another violent death in Venice before Brunetti and his colleagues begin to understand what is really going on.

“No one is more graceful and accomplished than Leon.” —The Washington Post

“The sophisticated but still moral Brunetti, with his love of food and his loving family, proves a worthy custodian of timeless values and verities.” —The Wall Street Journal

“[Brunetti’s] humane police work is disarming, and his ambles through the city are a delight.” —The New York Times Book Review

“The heady atmosphere of Venice and a galaxy of fully realized characters enrich this intriguing and finally horrifying tale.” —Publishers Weekly

“The first of Leon’s books to knit together all her strengths: endearing detective, jaundiced social pathology, and a paranoid eye for plotting on a grand scale.” —Kirkus Reviews
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Product: Blood from a Stone (Commissario Brunetti Book 14)
Description: When an immigrant dies on a Venice street, it will take a determined detective to pursue the case to its shocking end: “[An] outstanding series.” —Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review

On a cold Venetian night shortly before Christmas, a street vendor is killed in a scuffle in Campo San Stefano. The closest witnesses to the event are the tourists who had been browsing the man’s wares before his death—fake handbags of every designer label.

The dead man was one of the many African immigrants purveying goods outside normal shop hours and trading without a work permit. Once Commissario Guido Brunetti begins to investigate this unfamiliar Venetian underworld, he discovers that matters of great value are at stake within the secretive society. And his boss’s warning to avoid getting involved only makes Brunetti more determined to unearth the truth behind this mysterious killing.

“[A] stunning novel . . . an engrossing, complex plot.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“The appeal of Guido Brunetti, the hero of Donna Leon’s long-running Venetian crime series, comes not from his shrewdness, though he is plenty shrewd, nor from his quick wit. It comes, instead, from his role as an Everyman . . . [his life is] not so different from our own days at the office or nights around the dinner table. Crime fiction for those willing to grapple with, rather than escape, the uncertainties of daily life.” —Booklist
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Product: Death in a Strange Country (Commissario Brunetti Book 2)
Description: The New York Times–bestselling series continues with the murder of an American soldier in Venice: “This is definitely an author to watch (Kirkus Reviews).

Early one morning, Commissario Guido Brunetti of the Venice police confronts a grisly sight when the body of a young man is fished out of a fetid canal. All clues point to a violent mugging, but for Brunetti the motive of robbery seems altogether too convenient. When something discovered in the victim’s apartment suggests the existence of a high-level conspiracy, Brunetti becomes convinced that somebody, somewhere, is taking great pains to provide a ready-made solution to the crime.

Rich with atmosphere and marvelous plotting, Death in a Strange Country is a superb novel in Donna Leon’s chilling Venetian mystery series.

Praise for Donna Leon and the Commissario Brunetti Mysteries
“One of the best international crime writers is Donna Leon, and her Commissario Guido Brunetti tales set in Venice are at the apex of continental thrillers.” —Rocky Mountain News

“Leon’s books shimmer in the grace of their setting and are warmed by the charm of her characters.” —The New York Times Book Review

“Brunetti . . . long ago joined the ranks of the classic fictional detectives.” —Evening Standard

“Commissario Brunetti, most charismatic current Euro-cop, uncovers deadly ants’ nest of corruption. A highly accomplished, scary read.” —The Guardian
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Product: Friends in High Places (Commissario Brunetti Book 9)
Description: “By far the best” in the New York Times–bestselling, Macallan Silver Dagger–winning series featuring Venetian detective Commissario Brunetti (Evening Standard).

In this vivid and atmospheric mystery, Commissario Brunetti is visited by a young bureaucrat investigating the lack of official approval for the construction of Brunetti’s apartment years before. What began as a red tape headache ends in murder when the bureaucrat is later found dead after a mysterious fall from a scaffold. Brunetti starts an investigation that will take him into the unfamiliar and dangerous areas of drug abuse and loan-sharking, and will reveal, once again, what a difference it makes in Venice to have friends in high places.

“Beautifully written and immaculately plotted, Friends in High Places is further proof still that Leon can do no wrong.” —Scotsman

“Carefully plotted and full of colorful as well as sinister characters, this is crime writing of the highest order: powerful, relevant and all too full of human failings.” —The Guardian

“Leon tells the story as if she loves Venice as much as her detective does, warts and all. The plot and subplots unfold elegantly; beauty and the beast march hand in hand, and the result is rich entertainment.” —The Sunday Times (London)

“Leon’s best so far . . . I don’t think I could really understand a crime fan who didn’t love Donna Leon.” —Scotland on Sunday

“Leon is a skillful plotter . . . Brunetti is a nicely shaded creation, a moral man who is also all too human. Friends in High Places is a splendid read, clever and provoking.” —Observer (UK)
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Product: A Noble Radiance (Commissario Brunetti Book 7)
Description: Commissario Brunetti delves into the shadows of a Venetian family’s past in this “gripping intellectual mystery” in the New York Times–bestselling series (Publishers Weekly).

In A Noble Radiance, a new landowner is summoned urgently to his house not far from Venice when workmen accidentally unearth a macabre grave. The human corpse is badly decomposed, but a ring found nearby proves to be a clue that reopens an infamous case of kidnapping involving one of Venice’s most aristocratic families. Only Commissario Brunetti can unravel the clues and find his way into both the hearts of patrician Venice and that of a family grieving for their abducted son.

“Goes a long way to confirming Donna Leon’s claim to have taken literary possession of Venice . . . A Noble Radiance gives the reader a delightful foretaste of the summer holidays to come, but it also offers much more than that.” —The Independent on Sunday

“The marvel of this book is that almost every detail on every page forms part of a succession of clues, planted with exquisite precision, to unraveling the mystery.” —The Sunday Times

“Brunetti emerges as an intelligent, somewhat world-weary individual who believes in his cause if not the system itself. In short, he’s the ideal protagonist for this culturally rich mystery.” —Publishers Weekly

“In her detective novels with Commissario Brunetti, Donna Leon can paralyze the reader with a joyful suspense, lost in the environs of Venice and hopelessly in love with her central character and his wife.” —Mail on Sunday
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