The Jewels of Paradise
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3.0 • 17 Ratings
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- £6.99
Publisher Description
From the bestselling author of the Brunetti crime series comes The Jewels of Paradise, a gripping tale of intrigue, music, history and greed and Donna Leon's first stand-alone novel.
‘Splendid . . . A fascinating historical mystery. Full of authentic details and wittily recounted’ Independent
Caterina Pellegrini is a native Venetian, and like so many of them, she’s had to leave home to pursue her career. With a doctorate in baroque opera from Vienna, she lands in Manchester, England. Manchester, however, is no Venice. When Caterina gets word of a position back home, she jumps at the opportunity.
The job is an unusual one. After nearly three centuries, two locked trunks—believed to contain the papers of a baroque composer—have been discovered. Deeply connected in religious and political circles, the composer died childless; now, two Venetians, descendants of his cousins, each claim the inheritance. Caterina’s job is to examine any enclosed papers to discover the “testamentary disposition” of the composer. But when her research takes her in unexpected directions, she begins to wonder just what secrets these trunks may hold. . .
‘Written with all Leon’s elegant delicacy combined with her ability to reveal the truth almost without your noticing, this is a little gem of a book’ Daily Mail
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Taking something of a gondolier's holiday from her popular Commissario Guido Brunetti procedurals (Beastly Things, etc.), bestseller Leon debuts a stand-alone. Opera expert Caterina Pellegrini, who's been teaching in Manchester, England, returns home to Venice to accept an unorthodox assignment: researching the contents of recently discovered trunks believed to have belonged to a once renowned baroque composer, Agostino Steffani, who was also a bishop and a diplomat, so that his avaricious descendants can divide the estate. A more compelling mystery for the musicologist, however, concerns what lessons Steffani's life might offer as she wrestles with her own future. Despite the intriguing setup, Leon uncharacteristically fails to mine the premise for maximal emotion. There's too much obscure historical detail relative to the development of Steffani's character, lesser figures change arbitrarily to suit the plot's convenience, and finally, out of the blue, there's a slapdash deus ex machina ending. Consider this one a paradise lost.
