Selected Product:
| The City of Falling Angels
Abridged, Au
Edition: Abridged
Publisher: Random House Audio
Release Date: 2005-09-27
ISBN-10: 0739311468
ISBN-13: 9780739311462
List Price: $26.95
Average Customer Rating:
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Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com
It was seven years ago that Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil achieved a record-breaking four-year run on the New York Times bestseller list. John Berendt's inimitable brand of nonfiction brought the dark mystique of Savannah so startlingly to life for millions of people that tourism to Savannah increased by 46%. It is Berendt and only Berendt who can capture Venice--a city of masks, a city of riddles, where the narrow, meandering passageways form a giant maze, confounding all who have not grown up wandering into its depths. Venice, a city steeped in a thousand years of history, art and architecture, teeters in precarious balance between endurance and decay. Its architectural treasures crumble--foundations shift, marble ornaments fall--even as efforts to preserve them are underway.
THE CITY OF FALLING ANGELS opens on the evening of January 29, 1996, when a dramatic fire destroys the historic Fenice opera house. The loss of the Fenice, where five of Verdi's operas premiered, is a catastrophe for Venetians. Arriving in Venice three days after the fire, Berendt becomes a kind of detective--inquiring into the nature of life in this remarkable museum-city-- while gradually revealing the truth about the fire. In the course of his investigations, Berendt introduces us to a rich cast of characters: a prominent Venetian poet whose shocking 'suicide' prompts his skeptical friends to pursue a murder suspect on their own; the First Family of American expatriates who lose possession of the family palace after four generations of ownership; an organization of high-society, party-going Americans who raise money to preserve the art and architecture of Venice, while quarreling in public among themselves, questioning each other's motives and drawing startled Venetians into the fray; a contemporary Venetian surrealist painter and outrageous provocateur; the master glassblower of Venice; and numerous others--stool-pigeons, scapegoats, hustlers, sleepwalkers, believers in Martians, the Plant Man, the Rat Man, and Henry James.
Berendt tells a tale full of atmosphere and surprise as the stories build, one after the other, ultimately coming together to reveal a world as finely drawn as a still-life painting. The fire and its aftermath serve as a leitmotif that runs throughout, adding to the elements of chaos, corruption and crime, and contributing to the ever-mounting suspense of this brilliant audiobook.
Bonus feature includes an exclusive interview with the author!
From the Compact Disc edition.
A very tedious book
| Customer Rating: | | I got this book because I liked Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. This book should have been titled "What I did on my vacation in Venice". I have a rule to give up on a book after 100 pages but I broke my own rule because I kept thinking the book was going somewhere. It wasn't. It was like Midnight in that it gave you lots of side events in Venice but in Midnight there was an overarching crime. There was an attempt in this book to make the burning of the Fenice Opera House a similar overarching theme but it really wasn't nearly as interesting. I should have given up after 100 pages............ |
An interesting look at Venice, but not a "great" book
| Customer Rating: | | A friend gave this book to me as I was headed off to Venice for vacation. I had no expectations regarding the kind of story, but I did expect a great story given the author and topic. However, I was disappointed. It almost felt like a Vanity Fair article, or one long gossip column. Even so, I did persevere and finish the book because the redeeming qualities were that of the details. Venice is indeed a unique and enchanting city. So I enjoyed learning about some of the areas and buildings and the ins and outs of the people while reading the book. I do believe it had an impact on my impression of the city. So for that, I was pleased. But if you are expecting a good mystery, or a coherent plot line at best, don't; it's not that kind of book at all. |
Loved it.
| Customer Rating: | If this book had been pure fiction I would say it was filled with charming and quirky characters, a la Anne Tyler. As it is billed as non-fiction, I will say that it takes a different view of the players.
I have been to Venice only once and fell in love with the city. This book reminds me of the city, quiet, winding, much more under the surface than it appears.
I enjoyed this book so much I was sad when it finished it. |
A must read
| Customer Rating: | | I have had to buy a new book as the original one was so tatty from being passed on and re-read. It is essential reading if you have never visited Venice and are planning to do so. Thoroughly entertaining, too. |
city of falling angels
| Customer Rating: | Follows the pattern of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil but with a very different setting. 'Un-put-downable' is an overused phrase but it certainly applies to this book. As a frequent visitor to Venice, I found the descriptions very evocative, and the characters would not be out of place in a Donna Leon story.
Where next for John Berendt?........hopefully Sydney. |
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