Cosi fan tutti

About this book

Aurelio Zen's newest adventure is a delirious combination of the deadly serious and the seriously comic.With politics in Rome in flux yet again, Zen has landed in Naples as commander of the lowly harbor detail. Which leaves him time for a private life as "Alfonso Zembla" -- the name formed in the deaf ear of a wealth, seductive Neapolitan widow with several masons for asking "Dottor" Zembla's help in dissuading her daughters from marrying their possibly Mafia-associated fiances. Which Zen might be able to do -- his plan involves Neapolitan prostitutes masquerading as Albanian refuges -- except for the sudden spate of strange graffiti, marauding garbage trucks, officer impersonators, and disappearances he's expected to solve. Which in turn might be possible if Zen weren't being mistaken for the head of the most powerful and feared of Naples' crime families....Murder mystery as opera buffa. The Godfather meets Tootsie. Here is Mozart's opera turned on its head to test the faithfulness of men and the stamina of Michael Dibdin's usually serious-minded police officer, as he becomes the unwitting stage manager for this masterful interpretation of murder, mayhem, and the mysteries of love.