Donna Leon demonstrates again and again that a mystery novel need not be fast-paced, involve multiple crimes or even be particularly suspenseful to make compelling reading. She accomplishes this feat again in The Temptation of Forgiveness (2018).Leon's secret lies with interesting characters whose daily lives are filled with enough drama and comedy to keep readers entertained even as the mystery plods along. I sped through this novel more quickly than I do most mysteries.
This time the case before Commissario Guido Brunetti of the Venice police involves a man's death from a fall from a bridge in the middle of the night. It may have been an accident but seems suspicious, especially since the man's wife had visited Brunetti just a couple of days previously with worries that her teenage son might be involved with drugs. The commissario's first thought is that the father might have died in a confrontation with his son's drug dealer.
Brunetti seems to have a one-track mind, my main complaint with the novel. Rather than compile evidence and thoroughly question witnesses, first the wife and son, he always seems to start with a theory, then look only for evidence to support it. When that fails, he tries another theory and gathers more evidence. Yet his methods actually work in the end.
Meanwhile we are amused by his relationships with his wife and children and with the people he works with, especially Signorina Electra, the ever resourceful secretary who seems to be able discover with her computer any information Brunetti might desire. Among her secrets, known only to Brunetti, is that she has bugged the office of their boss.
While not the best book in the long series, The Temptation of Forgiveness (I love Leon's titles) will not disappoint.
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