The Potter's Field (Inspector Montalbano) (original 2008; edição 2011)

Ah, excellent! A great romp, with both laughter and danger, as Montalbano must solve a murder and save his dearest friend from folly at the same time. Exquisite orchestration of all the follies of our favorite characters, and of course, lots of food. ( )

Wow, another twisted story featuring Montalbano!

A bag is found in a field, with part of a foot sticking out... the body itself is chopped into 30 pieces and the finger tips are burned off, and there is a dental bridge (made in South America) in the stomach of the corpse. The corpse is about two months old, so why hasn't there been a missing persons report?

After the news story about the corpse appears on television a woman shows up and wants to file a missing persons report on her husband who just happened to disappear two months previously.

The remains of the body turn out to be that of a man whose father was killed in exactly the same manner many years prior, in South America, by a local Mafia Don. The now hospitalized Don calls in Montablano and explains that first murder was a mistake and proves that he is not responsible for the most current one.

A very well crafted plot that definitely held my interest! ( )

The subject here: loyalty. There's an interesting parallel between the Mafia Boss, his loyal team and the response to a lack of loyalty, and the Inspector's loyal team and his response to disloyalty. Montelbano's response is to grieve, and then to arrange for the disloyal one's lies to be unmasked in such a way that he is not distroyed but reconciled. His response parallels Christ's. It's a religious novel, dare I say.
In what ways is sexual betrayal - the same or different? Is sex just sex? or, imbedded in relationships, is it a parallel betrayal? Montelbano recognizes his own betrayal but doesn't seem to take it quite as seriously as Mimi's. A shower afterwards seems to help somewhat. Are relationships between men more important than those between a man and a woman?
( )

Inspector Montalbano is called to the scene where a body cut in pieces is found in a bag. Inspector Augello's recent behavior toward his colleagues has been terrible lately, and he comes in demanding Montalbano hand the case over to him. A man reports an incident he's witnessed where a woman was nearly run over. A woman comes into the station concerned about her husband who has failed to contact her in his travels. There's a lot going on in this novel which includes mafia and drug themes, but somehow Camilleri manages to weave the threads together into a cohesive plot. I listened to the audio version narrated by Grover Gardner. ( )

letto nello spazio di mezza giornata, troppo in fretta, forse? perché alcune cose non mi tornano...mi chiedo, ma Camilleri scrive ancora gialli o, nel corso degli anni, ha dato vita ad uno "stile", ad un nuovo genere, ad un cliché, ormai universalmente riconosciuto, apprezzato e celebrato e io mi "sveglio" solo adesso?è un giallo o un vezzo stilistico che il lettore arrivi almeno 100-150pagg prima del commissario alla soluzione del mistero? è voluto?certo, la vena comica dei pezzetti con Catarella è immutata, li leggo e li rileggo e rido fino alle lacrime...ma per il resto io non sono soddisfatta, cosa dovrei apprezzare? la lingua? ma oramai l'abbiamo imparata, dalla val d'aosta alla sardegna; le tematica dell'amicizia tradita? ma per favore! e poi basta con tutta la disanima del dedicamento e dell'invecchiare di Montalbano...lo sappiamo che le serie dovrà finire, però così sembra tutto preordinato e programmato, come le scadenze delle ultime puntate di una telenovela
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Aux armes, citoyens! Formez vos bataillons! - Procyon Lotor ha scritto il 30 Jul 2008, 16:04 : *vezzo stilistico
IMHO no. Tu ci arrivi perchè non hai l'amicizia con Augello che ti paralizza, se ti metti nei suoi panni è moOolto differente. Il blocco viene da li.
*preordinato e programmato
Un poco si, ma non mi da ancora fastidio, piuttosto negli altri romanzi-fiaba che sta facendo e nelle altre deviazioni che pubblica mi chiedo che sassolini
si stia levando dalle scarpe.