A review by ericwelch
Through a Glass, Darkly by Donna Leon

4.0

Donna Leon is a marvel. She has created a cast of appealing characters that deliver intelligent solutions to mysteries. You won't get a lot of shoot-em-ups or car chases or flying off cliffs and surviving thousand foot falls. What you will have is well-written, realistic dialogue, and an examination of Italian, or at least Venetian, culture.

The focus in this story begins with Brunetti helping the friend of a colleague who has been arrested at an ecology demonstration protesting workers' exposure at glass factories to harmful chemicals. That morphs into death threats from the owner of a factory and blame one of the workers assigns to those chemicals for the mental disability of his children. We all know a murder is on the horizon and it soon arrives for Brunetti to solve.

All her stories are told through Brunetti's eyes so we get a view of Venetian sprintime, the art of glass-making, as well as his wonderful relationship with Paula and the comic antics of Signorina Elletra as she and Brunetti suffer the foolishness of their superior Vice-Questore Patta, not to mention the food, culture and ambiance of Venice. 

Excellent if not the outcome Brunetti would have wished.