Venice in August is a truly oppressive place, and even more so for Donna Leon's long-suffering Commissario Guido Brunetti, here in his 19th outing exploring the assorted crimes and misdemeanours lurking beneath the surface of that tourist drawcard. Where About Face featured a freezing winter, A Question of Belief demonstrates that stifling humidity which much of Europe suffers as their summer draws to a close. Not for no reason do many Italians take a holiday in August - a fact which plays a number of roles in Brunetti's investigations here.
In typical Leon fashion, A Question of Belief begins in a low-key manner. Brunetti is approached by his investigative partner Vianello who is troubled by his aunt's recent fascination with horoscopes and astrology. While both men agree that this could well be the harmless interest of a mature woman, Vianello at least seems to think that Zia Anita's interest verges on the unhealthy.
No sooner has this question been raised, when Brunetti is contacted by a former schoolfriend who is concerned regarding irregularities at the Tribunale, Venice's court. It appears that certain cases are being delayed (delayed longer than normal, both men remark) to the possible advantage of one party, and that the cases delayed in such a way are brought before a certain judge and administered by a certain clerk.
It is unclear whether anything here is a crime. Brunetti, in fact, asks his friend what he wants him to do, and receives the response, "I hoped you might be able to think of something to do. And I hoped you'd be outraged by it." Brunetti recognises that something is potentially at issue - particularly if money is changing hands - but is resigned to the customary willingness of the Italian establishment to ignore such matters.
Perhaps needless to say, things do develop from here, albeit at Leon's customarily languid pace. Vianello's concerns about his aunt become slightly more serious, as she seems intent on giving large amounts of the family savings to what he describes as "a soothsayer", leading to a very impressive sequence featuring no fewer than three detectives (Brunetti, a young trainee and the under-utilised Pucetti) tailing the woman across Venice to find out the destination of the funds. Again, in the way that only Leon ever really could, the climax of the scene is a deadpan series of remarks at the expense of Venetian real estate prices, brought about by Brunetti's seemingly-inexhaustible understanding of the landscape of the city and its distinctive cadastral street-numbering system.
But of course this is a murder mystery, and Brunetti eventually finds himself suffering the ignoble fate of being recalled from his family vacation in the Italian Alps (along with Vianello, who's been brought back from the Croatian coast on a Coast Guard launch) to investigate the crime. The initial phone call recalling Brunetti, incidentally, is made by Commissario Claudia Griffoni, who was introduced in About Face and perhaps is on the verge of become another series regular - not a bad idea, as the main female characters in the series so far can occasionally become ciphers when Leon needs to cover a lot of plot very quickly.
Brunetti's investigation sees him take in everywhere from the Tribunale itself to the city's medical testing centre and the iconic Madonna dell'Orto church, all of which are described in Leon's inimitable manner. The locations are, of course, real anyway, but reading them there is a palpable sense of them jumping off the page.
It wouldn't be a Donna Leon novel without the domestic interludes, either. While the Brunetti family spend most of the novel in the Alps (and even his in-laws don't get much of a look-in - his redoubtable mother-in-law is only at the end of a phone twice, while his father-in-law is completely absent), we are compensated for this with an extended family dinner scene earlier in the novel. Brunetti's son Raffi is described as having recently adopted Marxism, only to discard it just as quickly, while his daughter Chiara is still the family's conscience, particularly in relation to air-conditioning in the Venetian heat.
The cynicism of both Brunetti and his wife Paola seems to have almost completely rubbed off on both children, though, despite the best intentions of their parents. Given that the series has shown Raffi and Chiara growing up, it becomes increasingly difficult not to view them almost as the children of old friends by this point - one is almost tempted to say "My, how you've grown" on first "meeting" them in the pages of their next novel.
Additionally, the comedy of the Questura is front and centre here. This is very much a good thing, as some parts of this novel do at least attempt to pose tricky questions to the reader (the relationship between psychology and fortune-telling is one such, as is the question of what makes a person "good"), so light relief is never a bad idea.
Vice-Questore Patta is his usual officious self, and his rationales for alternately permitting and preventing Brunetti from doing the most logical things are as cynical as ever. His underling, Lieutenant Scarpa, doesn't get much of an outing here, although the views of many of the detectives about his abilities as a trainer are definitely amusing.
And of course there is the amazing Signorina Elettra, secretary to the Vice-Questore and hacker extraordinaire. Whether or not her skills are remotely plausible is largely irrelevant, as she gets some of the best lines of all here - including her explanation of a purchase order for new computers, her description of the challenges of obtaining certain phone records, and her glorious re-telling of a "date" during which she has attempted to ferret out information for Brunetti.
The real star here in many ways is the city of Venice itself. Not necessarily the landscape, but the culture. Brunetti himself begins his investigation into the Tribunale irregularities by pondering that he knows "a general good feeling" about the judge involved, and a strong theme here (as ever in Leon) is the power of gossip and rumour in a small town like Venice. Key plot developments are arrived at by the power of what characters aren't saying, and Brunetti is asked on several occasions how he intends to prevent reputational damage to his suspects and the victim.
The food, too, is as central as ever. Contrary to common tourist opinion, Venice is a city of great food, and Leon takes considerable pains in describing the plates of chicchetti which are ordered at some points, and the vast array of tramezzini Brunetti and Vianello indulge in during their investigations. Even a takeaway pizza Brunetti buys near the end of the case sounds very appetising indeed.
In all of this, it's tempting to wonder if one strand of the plot may have taken a back seat. Indeed, Vianello does precisely this at one point. While the two investigations don't necessarily move at the same speed, there are surprising and unusual links between them. Leon's mastery of the crime novel form allows her to play around with the idea of the "unconnected cases" in a way that only a writer with a long-established series can.
The conclusions, when they arrive, are satisfyingly unexpected. The solution to the murder may be a little trite for some tastes, but the logic hangs together, and allows Brunetti one last stab at the quirks of criminal justice before his well-deserved return to the Alps and the end of his Ferragosto vacation.
Donna Leon has categorically done it again. Five stars
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