Dressed for Death: A Guido Brunetti Mystery - Hardcover

Leon, Donna

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060177950 ISBN 13: 9780060177959

Publisher: Harpercollins, 1994

Synopsis

In this third novel in the acclaimed series featuring the suavely determined Venice police commissario Guido Brunetti, Donna Leon once again leads readers into the delights and dangers of a Venice only natives know, with the help of the city's bestloved sleuth - and unwitting hero.
On a steamy, fetid August morning - the sort that the Adriatic coast is infamous for - a male corpse in female clothing turns up outside a slaughterhouse. At first, Brunetti draws the obvious conclusion, that the corpse is that of a transvestite prostitute killed by one of his johns. When the victim is identified as the sober-sided director of the Banca di Verona, Brunetti realizes that he won't be taking his much-needed vacation after all. He turns up a link between the bank and the powerful Lega della Moralita, and when two people connected to the case die violently, Brunetti fears he may be the third but redoubles his efforts to uncover exactly what the Lega's goals are.
In Dressed for Death, Guido Brunetti faces his most potent foe yet, one with ties to the highest echelons of finance, the government, even the Church. While the tension mounts, we are treated to crystalline glimpses of Venice - at its best and worst - as seen through the singularly discerning gaze of Brunetti, devoted family man, bemused civil servant, and thoroughly irresistible sleuth.

About this title

About the Author:

Donna Leon teaches English at the University of Maryland Extension at a U.S. Air Force base near Venice, Italy.

From Kirkus Reviews:

You're dressed for death when you're wearing a red dress, red pumps, and red lingerie--especially if you're Leonardo Mascari, director of the Venice branch of the Bank of Verona, fatally beaten in the Venetian suburb of Mestre. The evidence suggests that Mascari is a member of Venice's sad community of transvestite prostitutes, but Commissario Guido Brunetti (Death in a Strange Country, 1993, etc.) doesn't believe the evidence. After discovering Giancarlo Santomauro of the Lega della Moralit... in the apartment of a male prostitute who recognizes Mascari's picture but says he doesn't, Brunetti realizes he's up against something considerably more sordid than a sex killing. He's soon on the track of a simple and nasty scheme involving tax fraud and a protection racket on a heroic scale. But knowing isn't proving, and as the crooks begin eliminating each other, Brunetti, already battling political pressures in his office, wonders if he'll ever be able to make a convincing case against any of the honorable men who are left standing when the blood has cleared. 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. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harpercollins
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0060177950
• ISBN 13: 9780060177959
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 278