Donna Leon

‘Donna Leon has been giving unto us for all of the thirty years since Death at La Fenice introduced us to Brunetti‘ Val McDermid

The gifted Venetian detective returns in his 31st case – this time, investigating the Janus-faced nature of yet another Italian institution. Brunetti will have to once again face the blurred line that runs between the criminal and the non-criminal, bending police rules, and his own character, to help an acquaintance in danger.

Donna Leon is author of the much-loved, best-selling series of novels featuring Commissario Brunetti and one of The Times 50 Greatest Crime Writers. Widely considered one of the best detective series ever, with admirers including Ursula K. Le Guin and Antonia Fraser, the Brunetti Mysteries have won numerous awards around the world and been translated into thirty-five languages.

We’re delighted to welcome both Donna Leon and our guest interviewer Harry Sidebottom: it’s a great pairing from both ends of the historical telescope. Published when she was 49, the idea for Donna Leon’s debut novel Death at La Fenice came about when she attended a rehearsal at Venice’s Teatro La Fenice opera house. A friend muttered, ‘I could kill the conductor’, and the idea of the plot was born, along with the character of Guido Brunetti. Feverishly writing the manuscript in between shifts at her day job teaching military personnel at a nearby US Army barracks she left it in a desk for a year before being encouraged by a friend to submit it for the Suntory Mystery Fiction Grand Prize.

Awarded the Prize, along with a two-book publishing contract, Donna Leon has written a new Brunetti mystery every year since. Published in her eightieth year, Give Unto Others is the thirty-first.