I enjoyed reading this novel. However I agree with another reader in that the novel has too many loose ends - too many crimes unsolved. I won't describe them here as I don't want to spoil it for other readers. Perhaps this is part one of a series? We need to ask Donna Leon to do a sequel and wrap things up, once Brunetti has made some decisions as how to finalize the crimes, etc. He seems to be sitting on the fence!

I enjoyed reading this latest in the Commissario Brunetti series, but for some reason that I can't identify, this book seemed a bit different than her previous books. Something about the style I think .....

I have been a total fan of Donna Leon's Brunetti series.....until now! This newest book was UNFINISHED. She abruptly ends the book without fleshing out the original reason for the mystery. What about the strange behavior of the teenage son? What about the condition of the victim? What about the drug angle? Loose ends all around. Seems this should be Part One of a two part book....or just a short story. I've noticed this with another of Leon's books....abrupt ending with unsatisfactory conclusion...or no conclusion. Seems to me that she was required to finish another book by her publisher and dashed this off. Disappointing. "By Its Cover" was another Leon mystery that did the same thing: abrupt unfinished ending; weak reason for a mystery; lack of character building. I got the same shock of "What happened?!" Her other work has been so rich and full....but she's had two flops. Sigh.

Brunetti is called to investigate a man seriously injured from a fall late at night. When he sees the man at the hospital, he recognizes him as the husband of one of Paola’s colleagues who had come to him weeks earlier, suspecting her son of using drugs.

Drug use and abuse is at the heart of this 27th book in this favorite mystery series. Excellent page-turning reading as usual! Brunetti’s female colleagues play big roles in his thinking while solving the case.

While any novel about Commissario Brunetti and his now-familiar family, friends, and colleagues is a pleasure, this one doesn't quite live up to her usual standards. There are too many subplots, red herrings, dangers to too many people we've come to care about. The story line seems fragmented, and Brunetti's more ambivalent than usual about the morality of the solution to the main mystery. Greed is a major motive for many of the characters involved, but Brunetti's usual cynicism proves this assumption wrong. The interesting question is what he'll do when he's proved wrong.

Long awaited and well worth it. This is Donna Leon at her best. The title is the theme throughout an intriguing scenario revolving around the drug culture and parental concerns..