He opened the refrigerator: Adelina had prepared a hefty dish of boiled shrimp…they were drinking an exquisite white wine his father had found in Randazzo. Can you make it Friday evening?’… A dish of pasta with garlic and oil could be served without any problem. Back inside, he made himself a dish of spaghetti with a sauce of sea urchin pulp and turned on the television…’Listen, Montalbano – I forgot to mention it this morning – my wife had invented a fantastic new recipe for baby octopus. …When he woke, as the mid-September sea was flat as a mirror, he went for a long swim. For those of us in the United States the reasons are obvious: the Mediterranean landscape, the sun, the sea… mostly, though, the FOOD. Then what’s the draw, you ask? Well I can’t speak for the Italians. There are twists, turns, political scandals, great dialogue, charismatic informers, beautiful women and evil men… none of those things are why you should read this book or why I’ll continue onto the next book in the series. But why bother? Just trust me when I tell you that it’s a good mystery. If I were a good reviewer I would, at this point, go into the plot. He is the perfect Italian hero, down to the mole on his cheek. It would be difficult not to find him a compelling. He is well-known, good at his job, seemingly liked and respected by everyone – an all-around great guy.

Montalbano lives and works on the island of Sicily. He is handsome, a “real man”, in love with & faithful to his girlfriend Livia (which he has ample opportunities to prove – women proposition him at a rate that would make Mikail Blomkvist look celibate). The Shape of Water, the first book of the series, introduces Inspector Salvo Montalbano. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that Camilleri was a fan of the show. The slashes act a lot like the famous gong on Law & Order. Two pages later we are with him re-examining the crime scene.

One moment Montalbano is scouring the newspaper for information, the next he’s on the phone. The author keeps the action moving and the reader’s interest by cutting from scene to scene with the use of dark slashes (similar to the ones on the cover). The Shape of Water is a skillfully written, fast-paced police procedural. But as experience and the Twilight series have taught us – success does not always equal quality.įortunately for Camilleri, and for us, here the two go hand-in-hand.

All in all, it looks to have been hugely successful. There was an Italian TV series that ran for 1999 to 2008. Andrea Camilleri’s Inspector Montalbano series consists of nineteen novels and four short story collections – fourteen of which have been translated into English.

The shape of water camilleri