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The Girl of His Dreams (A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery) | 
| Author: Donna Leon
Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
Category: Book
List Price: $24.00
Buy New: $11.00
You Save: $13.00 (54%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  11 reviews
Sales Rank: 381
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 272
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6.3 x 1.2
ISBN: 0871139804
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780871139801
ASIN: 0871139804
Publication Date: May 13, 2008 (New: This Week)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Never read First American Edition hardcover with dust jacket. Slight edgewear of dust jacket. Otherwise unread, clean and tight. Ships quickly from FL.
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Amazon.com
Amazon Best of the Month, May 2008: Reading The Girl of His Dreams leaves you no choice but to reconsider what makes a mystery novel so good. Certainly there's no denying the appeal of a hard-boiled crime story, where more often than not a brilliant yet battered P.I. drives you white-knuckled to the edge of your seat, but Donna Leon's Guido Brunetti--at once exactingly inquisitive and disarmingly sensitive--bucks that genre convention entirely. Here, in Leon's seventeenth Brunetti mystery, is a man who investigates the tragic drowning of a young Gypsy girl relentlessly, yet--in his thoughtful meanderings through the streets and cafes of Venice--also struggles to understand the human warps and weaknesses that make his beloved city so vulnerable. In the end, it's this pure love and curiosity for life (and, I admit, his lusty appreciation of daily luxuries like prosecco, good coffee, or a burst of sunshine) that make Brunetti such a seductive hero--so much so that you're willing to follow him wherever he goes. --Anne Bartholomew
Product Description
Donna Leon’s Commissario Guido Brunetti mysteries have won legions of fans for their evocative portraits of Venetian life. In her novels, food, family, art, history, and local politics play as central a role as an unsolved crime. In The Girl of His Dreams when a friend of Brunetti’s brother, a priest recently returned from years of missionary work, calls with a request, Brunetti suspects the man’s motives. A new, American-style Protestant sect has begun to meet in the city, 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 Paola, along with Inspector Vianello and his wife, go undercover.
But the investigation has to be put aside when, one cold and rainy morning, a body is found floating in a canal. It is a child, a gypsy girl. Brunetti suspects she fell off a nearby roof while fleeing an apartment she had robbed. He has to inform the distrustful parents, encamped on the mainland, and soon finds himself haunted by the crime--and the girl. Thought-provoking, eye-opening, and profoundly moving, The Girl of His Dreams is classic Donna Leon, a spectacular, heart-wrenching addition to the series.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 6 more reviews...
 a very elegant and lyrical read May 13, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Once again Donna Leon delivers another graceful and thoughtful Commissario Brunnetti installment. Leon's style of writing and the way she develops the plot my not be everyone's cup of tea, and "The Girl Of His Dreams" may not rank amongst Leon's best work, but truly, I really enjoyed the book.
When a childhood friend of Brunetti's eldest brother, a priest, Padre Antonin, approaches Brunetti about his fears that a scam may being perpetrated, Brunetti is suspect about Antonin's motives. Always suspicious about the clergy and having some not very good memories of Antonin, Brunetti is tempted to let the matter drop with only the most superficial of investigations. But Brunetti's queries reveal that Antonin may be onto something afterall. It looks as if a brand new Christian sect has opened up shop in Venice, and several of the sect members have been persuaded to donate money to the sect. Is Mutti a scam artist as Anotonin claims? Or is Antonin afraid that Mutti may prove too much competition for the Church? But before Brunetti can go further with his queries, he becomes involved in another criminal investigation, this time involving the suspicious drowning of a young gypsy child. The young girl's death haunts Brunetti and his colleagues so much that Brunetti resolves to figure out how this child died and bringing whoever was responsible to justice...
It is true that Donna Leon's Commissario Brunetti novels have changed a little over the years, becoming more introspective, quieter and less complex. But the books are still compelling and make for very enjoyable reading. It is true that there is very little suspense or tension, and I can understand the disappointment that some of the previous readers have had with "The Girls of His Dreams;" but really one also reads Donna Leon for the quiet lyricism she writes, the wonderfully evocative manner in which she describes Venice in all it's various seasons and for the regional political issues she informs us about -- it's my way of keeping in touch with what's going on in Italy on a social level other than through the media. "The Girl of His Dreams" was a very quiet, elegant and lyrical read, but it may not be to every reader's taste, esp given the ending, but I enjoyed it nevertheless. As other reviewers have already mentioned, "The Girl of His Dreams" may not rank as one Leon's most stellar of offerings, but for stalwart fans, it will prove to be an enjoyable and rewarding read.
 The Last Two Donna Leon Books May 12, 2008
1 out of 5 found this review helpful
After the shock of "Suffer The Little Children" which was totally inferior to the preceding excellent books, "The Girl of His Dreams" is an improvement. Not back to full form but acceptable. Hopefully Ms Leon has not lost her touch.
Pleasant and intelligent company. May 11, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I'm surprised at the people who are so vituperative about the Leon style. They should stick to American smart-aleck, spunky, violent mysteries, and leave the Italians to us. I read Leon for the pleasure of her company, and that of her policeman. I concur that Camilleri is also a terrific read (more "sprightly" and offhand than Leon), and the best of all is Magdalene Nabb.
If you don't know these writers, maybe you should peek at a few pages and see how it grabs you.
A girl of his dreams; A book to put you to sleep May 11, 2008
4 out of 7 found this review helpful
Donna Leon likes to raise your political consciousness and usually succeeds. This time she lets us know that in Italy, anything is for sale; except the Venetian police - unless you are looking to get promoted. Frankly, this one is a deep yawn: we never care about the victim, even though the hero [protagonist if you are an English major] does; we don't care about the victims family; and frankly, we don't even care about the hero's enchanted family.
As a subplot, Donna Leon appears to believe that Venizia should only be for the Venetians. We touristas out never set foot there, and Venetians should stop selling out and living elsewhere. By tourists, she includes anyone not a native; even if you are Italiano. By our not going there and buying up the good apartments, Venice would then be affordable to the locals, and she and the other ex-patriots can return to San Marco Plaza untroubled by anything other which wine to savor and those pesky pigeons.
The anything is for sale in Venice\Italy is not a new theme for Leon, but this is the first time that she has applied it to the lowest classes; although this surely is not the first instance of this happening in "her" fair city.
Oh,yeah, the basic plot is unbelievable if not non-existent; the characters plastic and police work jejuene. and I'm a Donna Leon fan.
Local Color . . And Little Else of Interest May 11, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
Before writing my review, I waited two days after reading The Girl of His Dreams to see if I liked the book any better after sleeping on it. I didn't. Sorry, Ms. Leon. This one's a clunker. Why? Of two cases, only one is interesting. And the investigation of the interesting one isn't very stimulating. This book will only appeal to those who enjoy thinking about the injustices that victims experience.
As the book opens, crime seems to have taken a holiday in Venice and Commissario Guido Brunetti has plenty of time to investigate a mysterious preacher who is looking for big donations on the behalf of a priest he barely knows. Naturally, there's no crime to pin down, but Brunetti decides to look around anyway.
Before the preacher's background and motives can be understood, Brunetti has to deal with a most unpleasant duty . . . pulling a dead girl from the water. Here's where the local color comes in. The girl is a Gypsy (the P.C. term is Rom), part of a family that steals for a living. As you can imagine, Gypsies aren't interested in telling their troubles to the police.
How will Brunetti find out what happened to the girl? That's the real mystery of this book. A lot of the leads turn out to be misleading which provides a few mild surprises.
Once again, you'll learn that the police aren't able to do very much about crime, those in the establishment who complain often have things to hide, and the poor aren't as bad as everyone else thinks. The explication of those points is, however, not very interesting compared to other books in this series.
Did I need to read this book to remain a fan of this series? Not really. You have the option to pass on this one.
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