A new volume in the Venetian Commissario Brunetti series is much anticipated & always welcome, and the latest addition does not disappoint. After 30 already, Donna Leon is still coming up with new plots & settings. Family & work relationships are kept fresh, with even the characters being surprised! This writer is one of those special ones whom you can rely on for a high quality, well-written story. Although this book would work perfectly well as a ‘stand-alone’, why deprive yourself of the pleasure of reading the whole series? Most highly recommended!

I loved being back in this world ..Brunetti works out a crime and navigates characters and family in familiar ways .. it's a bit plot-light and maybe over written ..slow moving (not her very best) but the story of a bullied boatman son and trafficking of girls could not be more timely.

Donna Leon submerses Commissario Guido Brunetti in the injury of two American girls left outside a Venetian hospital by the two men who were responsible for their boating accident. Brunetti and his colleague Claudia Griffoni discover one of the men works for his uncle whose boat company is rumored to have criminal activities. Brunetti has to reach out to other Italian coast guard and Carabinieri. Brunetti has to face the worst criminal activities and keep his humanity. Great story.

I don’t know how the author keeps going, but she does and delivers yet another great book. This is number 30 for those keeping track. As always it’s a wonderful mix of a great detective story and an homage to Venice. I never tire of the setting. I think the reader would be best served following the series in order but not an absolute requirement. Enjoy an espresso and a great read! Imagine you are in the most beautiful city as you follow along. Sigh. Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the arc.

Sit yourself down with a nice cappuccino, settle back into your more comfortable chair and plan on reading this book in one go! Donna Leon does it again with Transient Desires, you won't be able to put this book down.

Two young women are dropped of at the Pronto Soccorso (ER) of the local hospital. One is unconscious, the other injured, and neither can remember exactly what happened. Two young men are captured on video dropping the girls off and disappearing. But what happened to injure the girls, and who are the two young men? Are they good Samaritans, or are they perpetrators of violence. Commissario Guido Brunetti is on the case, along with his trusty colleague Claudia Griffoni and font of information Signorina Elettra. Unclear whether a crime actually occurred, Brunetti and Griffoni dig in to find the answer.

One of the things I love about Leon's books is that at first you aren't even sure what the crime is. Little by little, like a spider spinning its webbed, you get sucked into the story, until by the end you are totally wrapped up in it (pun intended!). And the ending will leave you wanting more! A wonderful read, I loved it!

The thirtieth in the series and still the interest in Brunetti and of course Venice never dies. Crimes abound and the past is very much alive in all present crimes with family links and old history and activities very much part of the present day scene.

In this one as usual the setting of Venice takes a predominant part in the story (for me anyway) and Brunetti comes a close second!

Two injured American girls have been left on the dock of a hospital. One is with a broken arm, the other is unconscious for days. There is no sexual assault and the CCTV cameras distinctly shows who was responsible. A little sleuting on Commissario's part and the culprits are identified. This is where it begins to get complicated. One of the boys is connected to a businessman who has been on the radar of the police for sometime, but with absolutely no proof of any wrong doing. He is doing very well, has risen from the ranks but there is no indication of how he gets his money. When Brunetti stumbles upon some clues leading to human trafficking, the detectives know the story is linked to their suspects but now they have to connect the dots, and get foolproof evidence to obtain a warrant and an arrest.

Described as crime fiction with a dose of culture, I could not describe it better.

I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley.

I have read and enjoyed many of Donna Leon's mystery novels that take place in Venice. She always draws an accurate account of the police procedures, the politics, and customs of this northern Italian city. In addition, the reader sees the personal side of Brunetti as a family man and one who cares for his co-workers.

This story starts with two young women who are left outside the emergency room at the local hospital. Who left them? What happened to them? What is the real story behind their circumstances? These questions lead Brunetti and his colleagues on a dangerous hunt.

Intrigue and crime in Venice.

In this thirtieth volume looking at police procedurals and crime in Venice fewer tourists are in evidence given the pandemic. However in this latest work from Leon two young American women are injured in a boating incident on the Laguna, one dreadfully. They are deposited on the quay outside the Emergency Room of the Ospedale Civile, dropped by two young men in the launch. This all requires investigation. A number of problems have arisen.
The enquiry becomes complicated. One of the men in the boat is the nephew of Pietro Borgato, owner of a large International transport company, who whilst he's never been caught, is suspected of being involved in various smuggling operations.
Commissario Guido Brunetti is as ever erudite and thoughtful. Napoletana Claudia Griffons, Brunetti’s colleague is a shrewd successful woman working in a male dominated world. They work well together.
As the case evolves we have the coast guard becoming part of the action (that is interesting)
the Nigerian mafia is made mention of and things become very twist and cloak and daggerish. Mention of empty cruise ships and lack of tourists place this mystery fairly and sqaurely in the now.
On the home front, the children are becoming older and there's interesting discussions around the table.
This case raises many questions for Brunetti especially as his children are getting older.
I love Brunetti and this latest walk with him didn't disappoint.
I love the glimpses of Venice we view through Leon's prism. I always had the romantic idea of living in Venice for a few months--the most I managed was a few days, but I loved every moment.
Reading about Brunetti extends that love affair--every time! Even if it's gritty and edgy adding another yet layer.

A Grove Atlantic ARC via NetGalley
(Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.)

I would say not my favorite of this series. More people being trafficked (I just did a review for a somewhat similar title). Interactions seemed forced, characters were not well developed and it all seemed so tired overall.

This is my first outing with Commissario Brunetti and I really liked it. I didn't feel like I was missing anything by not reading the previous 29 books but I do plan to read them now.

The story begins with two young women who are found gravely injured on a loading dock at the hospital. Brunetti discovers that two men dropped them off. Vio and Duso have been life long friends. Vio works as a boatman for his uncle, Brogato, and Duso is a young lawyer. Brunetti feels that there is a reason they just left the girls and taking the risk of being arrested for leaving them. I don't want to give anymore away. I liked the characters and found the setting of Venice to be charming. I liked the ending in the sense that it was exciting but then at the same time I didn't like the ending. It felt like a cliffhanger but not one I will see resolved.

Thank you to Netgalley and Grove Atlantic for providing me with a copy of this book.

Here we are with the 30th installment chronicling the life of Commissario Guido Brunetti and his family. Most of all it's another glimpse at life in the glorious city of Venice. Guido is a native son and through him Venice is a living, breathing character in each book. Not just a backdrop to one of his cases but a city woven into every aspect of each and every case. Venice is one of my favorite cities and each book takes me back to the sights, the smells and the sounds - I'm transported without leaving home. The best and the worst, it's all there in technicolor.
Guido, the native and his partner, Claudia, a native of Naples take on the case of two American women dumped at the dock of a local hospital. No case is simple and straight forward in their world and that is one of the best things about this long running series. The puzzle in complex, well written and set at a pace that increases from chapter to chapter. It's the pace of Venice herself. It's a mystery that's as complex as Venice. Just knowing that there is a new case to watch Guido solve is enough to make me eager to read it. I don't need to know any details in advance. As usual, I wasn't disappointed.
My thanks to the publisher Atlantic Monthly Press and to NetGalley for giving me an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

Donna Leon’s 30th Commissario Guido Brunetti novel is as entertaining and refreshing as her first. It is filled with the family scenes and his musings on today’s society that make this so enjoyable to read. His clothes are a little tighter and he may be a little stiffer, but when he receives a report from his associate Griffoni concerning two American girls who were left unconscious on the dock of a hospital he uses his contacts and experience to discover what happened to them. Security cameras from the hospital leads him to Via and Duso, two young men who had taken the girls for a boat ride and were in an accident. Via works for his uncle’s shipping company, loading the boats and making deliveries. It was his uncle’s boat that was involved in the accident and Via is afraid of his uncle’s reaction. While neither Via nor Duso have any record, Via’s uncle is suspected of smuggling and is under investigation. While the young men are guilty of not reporting the accident, they did bring the girls to the hospital for treatment and Brunetti sees something in them that reminds him of his own son.

Brunetti has the help of his superior’s secretary, Signorina Elettra, who is a miracle worker when it comes to researching information. He also calls on Carabinieri Captain Nieddu, who has been watching the uncle. What started as a case with minor charges blows up to a case of greed and human trafficking and will take the Questura, the Carabinieri and the Guardia di Costiera to stop it. Through it all Brunetti has the support of his fellow officers and his wife Paola. Donna Leon brings Venice to life as he travels the canals and indulges in Italian cuisine. This is a series that will have you falling in love with the city and its’ residents and comes highly recommended. I would like to thank NetGalley and Grove Atlantic Publishing for providing this book for my review.

I cannot believe this is the 30th Inspector Brunetti book! I have really enjoyed this series. I have had the pleasure of visiting Venice several times, and Donna Leon does a good job of showing us what it is like for the locals. Brunetti is a police officer, so gets involved in all the ugly things that people do. This story is no exception. It is interesting to figure out along with Brunetti and his team what is happening and who is responsible. Always entertaining.

Two young women, tourists in Venice, are found severely wounded in front of a hospital one late night. Luckily, with the help of video surveillance they can quickly find out the two men who put them there. But which did they abandon them even though they first provided help? As commissario Brunetti investigates the case together with his colleague Claudia Griffoni, they happen to link one of the men to another crime of which the police only have a faint idea so far, but this might be their breakthrough.

Whenever I take up a Donna Leon novel on commissario Brunetti, I know what I will get: a crime story which is solved not by some miraculously appearing deus ex machina, but by meticulous police work combined with the protagonist’s clever instinct and the ability to read people and to actually listen to them. Apart from that, it is always like some kind of bookish holiday to travel to the Venetian Lagoon and to delve into its very unique atmosphere. The thirtieth instalment in the series does not disappoint in this respect.

Quite interestingly, the crime with which the novel opens is quite quickly solved and classified an accident and a series of unfortunate events and decisions. Yet, it is only the beginning of a real crime – a crime of the sort nobody wants to know about and people eagerly close their eyes on. This time, it is Brunetti’s colleague who stirs the investigation and the commissario not only gets to know her from an unknown side but also learns that Griffoni’s hometown of Naples could also be on another planet that different life works there.

A plot driven by interesting and strongly painted characters, just the sort of entertainment one knows Donna Leon to provide.

Transient Desires is the thirtieth book in the Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery series by Donna Leon and, as usual, it didn’t disappoint. This series is as fresh as ever. In this latest book, Commissario Brunetti finds himself involved in an investigation of a boating accident that badly injured two American women. Even though the case is outside his jurisdiction, his curiosity and his sense of justice doesn’t allow him to walk away.

Often Donna Leon uses her books to highlight issues and problems that society faces. Transient Desires is no different. In this book she gives insight to the issues of human smuggling, how it can occur, and the tragic cost of human lives.

Donna Leon is a prolific writer and her books are always very well-crafted. She brings her characters to life with dialogue and descriptions, the locale (usually Venice) is always a part of the storyline, and the plots are imaginative. Very often I find it hard to read just a few pages and I’m always looking forward to her next book. Thank you, Ms Leon, for the many hours of reading enjoyment you have provided.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a copy of this book for review.

Transient Desires is the 30th outing for Commisario Brunetti & co. by Donna Leon. Due out 9th March 2021 from Grove Atlantic on their Atlantic Monthly Press imprint, it's 288 pages and will be available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats.

As always, this series is wonderfully relevant, with deeply considered and nuanced philosophy, characters who really live and breathe and who aren't complete paragons or evil caricatures. Leon is certainly one of the deftest writers currently writing and her novels are a joy to read.

Although some interactions between Brunetti and his colleagues and family will resonate more deeply with long time fans, this book works perfectly well as a standalone (but I recommend the whole series - it's wonderful). The author is adept at providing enough backstory to keep new readers engaged and current without info-dumping. I love his interactions with his colleagues and especially with his family - always loving, always philosophical. His children are growing up and approaching young adulthood. Their questions (especially his daughter's philosophical probing) had me nodding along in sympathy with Brunetti's occasionally fraught conversational forays.

The inter-agency cooperations between the Italian Coast Guard, the Carabinieri, and the State Police (Brunetti's office) are impressive and faithfully rendered, complete with initial distrust and testing of one another. There's also a great deal of subtle local posturing and teasing between the Neopolitans and Venetians and the different local cultures which can cause friction.

The antagonist in this volume is suitably awful and the tension and plotting are, as always, top notch. My major problem with the book (which dinged a half mark off the final) was the absolutely car-crash *abrupt* ending. It. Just. Simply. Ended. It was so abrupt that I literally went looking for more pages (checked both eARC formats which I received for review - it truly does just *end* that abruptly apparently).

The language is relatively clean, a few minor swear words, nothing worse. Some of the themes (prostitution, smuggling, human trafficking, homophobia) elicit a world-weary resigned feeling from Brunetti and the official police, which some readers might find distressing.

Highly recommended for fans of procedurals. The whole series is worthwhile and one that I revisit regularly.

Four and a half stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

In the 30th Commissario Brunetti novel, Donna Leon continues her love story to Venice with another crime investigation. Like many of the past books, the actual crime is not the focus of the investigation, rather it is the steppingstone to questionable people involved in the crime. When Brunetti becomes interested in the dumping of two unconscious American women at a hospital, his curiosity leads him to a human trafficking business. The ending was too abrupt for me. I really wanted to know what happened to the two young Italian men who were caught up in this mess, but I can imagine the ending I want. I am satisfied Brunetti has used his intelligence to solve another case.

One opens a new Donna Leon wondering if all will still be as good as before.

Will the writing be as pellucid, the plotting as clear yet intricate, will the moral compass still be in place?

And with this, the thirtieth, as with all the others, the answers are still resoundingly in the positive.

There is so much here to provoke thought and maintain interest, so much of relevance to 2021.

This gave me immense pleasure and comes highly-recommended.

Thank you to Grove Atlantic and NetGalley for the digital review copy.

Transient Desires is the thirtieth instalment in the Commissario Guido Brunetti series, set in Venice, Italy. An ageing Commissario Brunetti blames the tightening waistband on his trousers on the dry cleaners, and it seemingly never even crosses his mind that it could be as simple as him having gained weight due to unhealthy eating habits. He carries out his daily duties of meeting with informants, dining with colleagues and entertaining and trying to be a family man for his spirited wife and dogmatic children. He also ruminates on the belief that eventually the tourist industry in Venice, despite helping the city to flourish now, will likely implode in the not too distant future destroying the city he holds so dear. It isn't long before he's faced with a heinous crime committed outside his jurisdiction: two young American women have been badly injured in a boating accident, joyriding in the Laguna with two young Italians who had seduced them after a Saturday evening spent drinking at Campo Santa Margherita. In the dark, the boat rams a stake and the American women end up abandoned in an unconscious and battered state on the pier of the Ospedalem in close proximity to the dock of the hospital. Why didn't her companions alert the emergency room when it was all just an accident? As Brunetti and his colleague, Claudia Griffoni, investigate the incident, they soon identify the two men who left the women there as a well-to-do young lawyer and his childhood friend, a boatman.

One of the young men works for a man rumoured to be involved in more sinister night-time activities in the Laguna. To get to the bottom of what proves to be a gut-wrenching case, Brunetti needs to enlist the help of both the Carabinieri and the Guardia di Costiera. The presence of these unfamiliar colleagues adds to the difficulty of solving a peculiarly horrible crime whose perpetrators are technologically brilliant and ruthlessly organised. The more persistently Brunetti investigates, the closer he gets to a monster that even the mafia fears. This is yet another riveting and compulsive police procedural with the slow-burning first three-quarters of the story made up of philosophical musings on Italian culture, life’s ephemeral nature and Guido’s day-to-day, run-of-the-mill police work. Because our protagonist, whom I am emotionally invested in, is such a complex and fascinating guy, details of his personal and professional life are equally as intriguing and had me thoroughly engrossed. The last quarter picks up the pace and much like the rest is richly atmospheric and rather melancholy. An authentic depiction of Venetian life, the dynamic action builds until the tension is palpable before a scintillating and exciting conclusion, involving both the coast guard and navy commandos, plays out. Those who have loved this series so far will find more of the same shenanigans here and new readers will be treated to a character-driven novel with plenty of substance and an intelligent and original plot. Highly recommended.

The arrival of a new Donna Leon - Brunetti novel is a spring time highlight. This the 30th in the series and still the stories are able to apture the magic of Venice but also the wisdom and compassion of Guido and his colleagues. This tale starts off with a seemingly tragic boat accident but then moves into a darker story with very real issues of today being confronted. Donna Leon is an incredible author who has crafted yet another superb story which as fans know will have you hooked from page one whether it be through ; the descriptions of the city, the mouth- watering meals encountered, the agony of a city in decline , the interactions between Guido and his family or a tightly constructed plot. Another gripping read...roll on the next one