Suffer the Little Children (Guido Brunetti Series #16)

by Donna Leon

Overview

“Donna Leon is the undisputed crime fiction queen . . . [Her] ability to capture the city’s social scene and internal politics is first-rate, as always, but this installment carries extra gravity and welcome plot twists that make it one of the series’ better efforts.” —Sarah Weinman, Baltimore Sun

Donna Leon’s charming, evocative, and addictive Commissario Guido Brunetti mysteries are widely acclaimed national and international best sellers, reaching a wider audience in the United States than ever before. Her latest, Suffer the Little Children, is classic Brunetti, a fantastic addition to the series.

When Commissario Brunetti is summoned in the middle of the night to the hospital bed of a senior pediatrician, he is confronted with more questions than answers. Three men—a young Carabiniere captain and two privates from out of town—had burst into the doctor’s apartment while the family was sleeping, attacked him, and taken away his eighteen-month-old boy. What could have motivated an assault by the forces of the state so violent that it has left the doctor mute? Who would have authorized such an alarming operation?

As Brunetti delves into the case, he begins to uncover a story of infertility, desperation, and illegal dealings. At the same time, Brunetti’s colleague, Inspector Vianello, discovers a moneymaking scam between pharmacists and doctors in the city. But it appears as if one of the pharmacists is after more than money. What secrets are in the records? And what has been done with them? Donna Leon’s new novel is as subtle and fascinating as her best mysteries, set in a beautifully realized Venice, a glorious city seething with small-town vice.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780802126153
Publisher:	Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
Publication date:	03/14/2017
Series:	Guido Brunetti Series , #16
Pages:	272
Sales rank:	112,470
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Donna Leon is the author of the highly acclaimed, internationally bestselling Commissario Guido Brunetti mystery series. The winner of the CWA Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction, among other awards, Donna Leon lived in Venice for many years and now divides her time between Venice and Switzerland.

Hometown:

Venice, Italy

Date of Birth:

February 28, 1942

Place of Birth:

Montclair, New Jersey

Education:

B.A., 1964; M.A. 1969; postgraduate work in English literature

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Suffer the Little Children:

“Leon’s sixteenth Commissario Brunetti mystery is brilliant; she has never become perfunctory, never failed to give us vivid portraits of people and of Venice, never lost her fine, disillusioned indignation.”—Ursula K. Le Guin, New York Times

“The most obvious appeal of Donna Leon’s novels about Commissario Guido Brunetti is that they are so supremely civilized . . . Leon’s novels are always a pleasure.”—Washington Post

“First-rate and masterful.”—Publishers Weekly

“In her sixteenth book featuring Brunetti, Leon vividly illustrates the power of fatherhood, captures the nuances of Venetian politics, and provides a finish as satisfying as it is tragic. But what lifts this series far above the norm is the humanity of Brunetti and his family and the charm of Venice . . . [they] take delight in the wonders of their city; little wonder that their readers will, too.”—Library Journal

“Donna Leon is the undisputed crime fiction queen . . . [Her] ability to capture the city’s social scene and internal politics is first-rate, as always, but this installment carries extra gravity and welcome plot twists that make it one of the series’ better efforts.”––Sarah Weinman, Baltimore Sun
“Donna Leon is keeping up an astonishingly high standard . . . A perfect blend of characters, place, mystery, and social issues . . . Her 16th Brunetti novel is also one of her best.”—Times (UK)

“Enthralling . . . The vibrant descriptions of the city, littered liberally throughout the novel, and the details of Venetian family life, keep the series feeling fresh and will hold your curiosity while feeling comfortingly familiar.”—Woman (UK)

“Leon’s fans who use Brunetti as an insider’s guide to Venice will not be disappointed.”—Times Literary Supplement (UK)

“While Leon raises some cogent social points in the course of the usual page-turning stuff, it’s never at the expense of her iron-clad storytelling skill. And Venice is conjured as atmospherically as we’d expect from a writer who does in words what Canaletto and Turner used to do in oils.”—Express (UK)

“If you are a fan of Donna Leon’s Commissario Brunetti (I am), Suffer the Little Children . . . is essential reading.”—Lady (UK)

From the Publisher

Suffer the Little Children . . . is terrific at providing, through its weary but engaging protagonist, a strong sense of the moral quandaries inherent in Italian society and culture.

San Francisco Chronicle

Donna Leon is the undisputed crime fiction queen. . . . [Her] ability to capture the city's social scene and internal politics is first-rate, as always, but this installment carries extra gravity and welcome plot twists that make it one of the series' better efforts.

Baltimore Sun

Leon's sixteenth Commissario Brunetti mystery is brilliant; she has never become perfunctory, never failed to give us vivid portraits of people and of Venice, never lost her fine, disillusioned indignation.
— The New York Times

Ursula K. Le Guin

Donna Leon is the ideal author for people who vaguely long for “a good mystery,” meaning a strong story with discreet violence, a wise detective who doesn’t drink or brood too much, and a setting that’s worth the visit. That Leon is also a brilliant writer should only add to the consistently comforting appeal of her Venetian procedurals featuring Commissario Guido Brunetti, an immensely likable police detective who takes every murder to heart.
— The New York Times

Marilyn Stasio

In Leon's 16th Commissario Guido Brunetti mystery, at once astringent yet lyrical, two rival police forces—Brunetti and his Venetian colleagues and the carabinieri—are both interested in a doctor who illegally adopts an Albanian infant. When three carabinieri break into the doctor's apartment and seize the child at night, they injure the doctor, leaving him mute. Much of the early action takes place in a hospital, and because Venetian hospitals appear only slightly less bureaucratic and Kafkaesque than their stateside counterparts, Leon's marvelous insights into Italian life, so sharp when she explores a military academy in Uniform Justice or glassblowers in Through a Glass, Darkly, aren't as fresh, sinister or compelling here. But once the IVs and bandages give way to vandalism at a pharmacy and the family secrets of a neo-Fascist plumbing tycoon, Leon regains her stride and the novel's last fifth is first-rate and masterful. Leon seldom delivers a "feel good" ending, choosing instead conclusions that are wise and inevitable while still being unsettling. (May)

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Publishers Weekly

Commissario Guido Brunetti of Venice does what it takes to solve a case, whether it's having his aristocratic father-in-law arrange a meeting with a powerful political figure or playing the part of a wealthy infertile man who'll do anything to get a baby. After the Carabinieri (Italy's military police) rouse a prominent pediatrician in the middle of the night for illegally adopting his beloved 18-month-old son, Brunetti investigates related adoptions (in which an Italian man swears, falsely, that he fathered a child by a foreign woman) plus a scam in which pharmacists and doctors bill for bogus appointments. The two cases become entwined after the shop of an "exquisitely moral" pharmacist is vandalized. In her 16th book featuring Brunetti, CWA Silver Dagger Award winner Leon vividly illustrates the power of fatherhood, captures the nuances of Venetian politics, and provides a finish as satisfying as it is tragic. But what lifts this series far above the norm is the humanity of Brunetti and his family and the charm of Venice, where Leon has lived for 25 years. Brunetti and his wife, Paola, separately take delight in the wonders of their city; little wonder that their readers will, too.
—Michele Leber

Library Journal

A baby-snatching leads Commissario Guido Brunetti not to the usual institutional corruption (Through a Glass Darkly, 2006, etc.) but to a more intimate kind of evil. Hours after his adopted son Alfredo calls Dottore Gustavo Pedrolli "papa" for the first time, the doctor and his wife, plumbing heiress Bianca Marcolini, are asleep in their Venice apartment. Five armed men break in, repel Pedrolli's feeble resistance and grab Alfredo. The abductors, amazingly, are carabinieri dispatched by an unknown complainant to end what was apparently an illegal adoption. But why did Captain Marvilli and his masked troops storm so violently into the apartment in the dead of night? After all, as Brunetti reflects, "this was not the United States." And why, given her fury over a brain-threatening injury to her husband, does Signora Marcolini seem so incurious about what's become of her son? These riddles lead Brunetti on a trip to a fertility clinic, where he and his boss's secretary, enterprising Elettra Zorzi, pretend to be a desperate, childless couple, as well as to a round of pharmacists, one of whom treats confidential medical information as a divine sword, and eventually to the unknown tipster, whose motive for betraying the adoptive parents is truly nauseating. Not a single murder, but the story would be strong enough without one even without a climactic assault whose only casualty is the characters' moral certitudes.

Kirkus Reviews