Product Description

Donna Leon’s mastery of plot, her understanding of Venetian manners and mores, and above all her philosophical, unfailingly decent protagonist have made the Commissario Brunetti mysteries bestsellers around the world, including an ever-growing American audience. In The Death of Faith, Brunetti comes to the aid of a young nursing sister who is leaving her convent following the unexpected death of five patients. At first Brunetti’s inquiries reveal nothing amiss, and he wonders whether the nun is simply creating a smoke screen to justify abandoning her vocation. But perhaps she has stumbled onto something very real and very sinister—something that puts her life in imminent danger.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #96348 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-29
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 320 pages

Review
Brunetti is the most humane sleuth since Georges Simenon’s Inspector Maigret. -- The Philadelphia Inquirer

No one knows the labyrinthine world of Venice . . . like Leon’s Brunetti. -- Time

One of the most exquisite and subtle detective series ever -- The Washington Post

Review
One of the most exquisite and subtle detective series ever (The Washington Post)

Brunetti is the most humane sleuth since Georges Simenon’s Inspector Maigret. (The Philadelphia Inquirer)

No one knows the labyrinthine world of Venice . . . like Leon’s Brunetti. (Time)

About the Author
Donna Leon has received both the CWA Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction and the German Corrine Prize for her novels featuring Commissario Guido Brunetti.

Customer Reviews

Books are often retitled - don't complain, do your homework!
First, to all the reviewers who complained that this book has been retitled from "Death of Faith": It's common for European books to have 'Also Published As' (APA) for the United States - in fact, three other Donna Leon books have APAs. For some authors like Agata Christie, almost every book has an APA. I agree that Amazon should show the APA, but why rely on them? Do your homework before you buy or read a book. For mysteries, a good site to consult is [...], which lists the titles (with APAs) for thousands of authors.

As to "Quietly in Their Sleep", I don't think that it's as good as the previous five books in the series (which I'm reading in order). I agree with some of the other reviewers who complained that too much of the book is anti-Catholic. Also, I must have missed something - which of the five elderly patients was killed?

However, I'll continue to read the Guido Brunetti series. There's eleven more after this one (including a Silver Dagger Award winner "Friends in High Places"). I enjoy the characters, especially the incredible Signorina Elletra, who can find out anything about anyone. And the setting, Venice, is a welcome change from the typical mystery setting of the US or Britain.

Buyer Beware
Caution Guido Brunetti fans, this book is as a fraud! "Quietly in Their Sleep" is nothing more than the unannounced retitling of Donna Leon's 1997 Venetian mystery "The Death of Faith". Although not one of her best efforts, the real crime here lies with both the publisher for changing the title and Amazon for failing to mention this fact. You both ought to be as embarrassed as any other villians in Leon's work.

Donna Leon on her Roman Church is Bad, Horse
Know that this book was published in Europe as "Death of Faith".

One of the questions that you have to ask yourself about this novel is, "how come Donna Leon is so mad at the RC Church"? As we have seen in some of her earlier books in this series, Guido's wife Paola will speak DL's mind on the subject of Church and Feminism. In this book, some of her anti-clericalism rubs off on the Commissario. We also get a much better look at Sgt. Vianello and Signorina Elletra .

The story itself is nothing grand, as compared to her earlier books, but is more of a polemic by DL. I found it most interesting to read about the attitude of the Venetians to the rest of Italy and to the place of the Church in 21st Century Europe. Leon seems to think that there is an underground guerilla war going on (with Opus Dei as the Church's SS) between the secular state and the religious right for control. She may be right but I don't think that a mystery novel is the place to make her point.