A Death in Tuscany

When a girl’s body is discovered in the Tuscan hill town of Scandicci in Giuttari’s gripping second novel featuring Chief Supt. Michele Ferrara (after 2011’s A Florentine Death), the police assume she’s another dead junkie, hardly worth the paperwork. But Ferrara, who heads Florence’s Squarda Mobile, becomes obsessed with the girl, who’s “little more than a child,” and soon proves that she was murdered. The disappearance of Massimo Verga, Ferrara’s best friend, complicates the investigation and puts the detective’s job at risk when Verga and his married lover are suspected of killing her husband. While a wider criminal network that includes pedophile parties, illegal immigrants, international drug running, political corruption, and the Mafia emerges, the plot never seems overstuffed, even when the two cases intersect. Giuttari, who served as Florence’s police chief for seven years, delivers an intriguing view of the Italian police and legal system in “the city of excess.” (Feb.)