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A Long Finish [Kindle Edition]

Michael Dibdin (Author)
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (53 customer reviews) |
Digital List Price: £4.28 What's this?
Print List Price: £7.99
Kindle Price: £3.42 includes VAT* & free wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet
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Kindle Edition £3.42   -- --
Hardcover --   -- --
Paperback £4.31   -- --
Audio, CD, Audiobook, Unabridged £19.38   -- --
Audio Download, Unabridged £13.87 or Free with Audible.co.uk 30-day free trial

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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

Fresh from the successful investigation of a series of crimes in Naples, that admirably devious and dour Italian police inspector Aurelio Zen returns to his office in Rome to discover that a new set of bureaucrats is in power--with plans to punish him for his success by sending to him Sicily to fight the Mafia. Fate, in the form of a powerful film director, offers a way out: Zen is to go instead to Piedmont, where the murder of a noted winemaker--apparently by his son and heir--threatens the future of one of the film director's favourite vintages. Even though Zen is a Venetian by birth and drinks "fruity, fresh vino sfuso from the Friuli intended to be consumed within the year", as the director sarcastically notes, he can still see how important the case can be to his future--especially if it keeps him away from deadly Sicily. Not only wine but also truffles are involved in a growing series of murders in the area around Alba, and Michael Dibdin (an English writer who lives in Seattle but must spend lots of time in Italy) once again manages to capture the heart, soul and stomach of the region. Zen, whose personal life is gradually revealed and expanded in each book in the series, finds out several surprising things about being a father in this one. Previous Zen titles include Cosi Fan Tutti, Dead Lagoon, Ratking and Vendetta. --Dick Adler

Review

"Once again, Dibdin delivers unforgettable characters in a tightly woven plot." --"The Globe and Mail

""Dibdin has a gift for shocking the unshockable reader. He writes the unmentionable, calmly and with devastating effect." --Ruth Rendell
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Product details

  • Format: Kindle Edition
  • File Size: 436 KB
  • Print Length: 388 pages
  • Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0571197191
  • Publisher: Faber and Faber Crime (6 Jan 2011)
  • Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
  • Language English
  • ASIN: B004INGZFO
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #6,700 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

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Michael Dibdin
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
By RachelWalker TOP 1000 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
Superb. If you've not read Dibdin, yet consider yourself a connoseur of crime fiction, you must rectify the situation: he's one of the greatest alive. No question.

A Long Finish is the sixth Zen, but do not start here. Go back to the beginning, to Ratking, and then simply chomp your way through the series, looking forward to this particular little gem (my favourite so far). In it we see Zen sent to Piedmont. He would be posted to Sicily, were it not for the influence of someone who wants a very important matter straightening out: the head of a wine-making family has been murdered, his son arrested and charged with the crime. The person-of-influence wants only one thing: the son released (innocent or not), so that the vines can be harvested and the year's vintage produced. Zen is the man for the job. So, off he goes, glad to escape the prospect of Sicily, a posting he has been dreading.

These Zen novels are brilliant. I've only discovered them in the past few months, but Dibdin's already become one of my new favourite authors (Rankin, Connelly, Dibdin, in the male-crime-writing stakes, probably). Zen is such a marvellous character, cunning and cynical, desperately self-serving at times, and yet (as she shows in this book), he has a sometimes-inconvenient (and foolish!) heart. He's witty, charming, sly, a unique creation.

Dibdin's writing suits his character perfectly: it too is cynical, sly, cunning, clever, and yet heart-felt. It's also, at times, hilarious (one characters eats in a restaurant and then "proceeded to damn the meal with praise so faint as to be virtually imperceptible").

I raced through this book in a day. The plot moves quickly (and is less convoluted than in his earliest Zen novels), the cahracters are fascinated and hugely entertaining, and the conclusion is, well, a triumph of restrained barbarism. I enjoyed it hugely. Hugely.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By E. Heckingbottom TOP 500 REVIEWER VINE™ VOICE
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)
Review of the CD version, read by Michael Kitchen Aurelio Zen: A Long Finish (Aurelio Zen Mysteries (AudioGo))

To start with, I wondered if I was ever really going to get into the book. Michael Kitchen's reading style is ... unusual to say the least; however, those who enjoy his performances in Foyle's War will be prepared for this to a certain extent. Pauses are made in unusual places,and words are run together where a pause might have made more sense; however the plot is intriguing and the book did manage to keep me hooked for several hours of my long journey home from Spain.

Set in a wine producing area to the North of Italy, Aurelio Zen is sent to discover who murdered a well known wine producer. Further murders follow on, and red herrings intersperse with true clues, leaving you unsure in many places: - Who did it, how and why?
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Davywavy2 VINE™ VOICE
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)
This is my first outing with Venetian detective Aurelio Zen, and at first I struggled. I struggled with the tortuous sentence structures and the verbose language (phrases like "The rain fell like melted hailstones" just annoyed me), and I struggled with Zen himself.

Compared with the supporting cast of obstructive wine makers, truffle hunters and farmers who populate the story, Zen seemed dull and oddly detached. It was only after the fourth disk that I began to sympathise with him at all, and that was mainly because he is eventually made more human by his relationship with his is-she-or-isn't-she estranged daughter, Carla.

The mystery itself is a meandering affair, which takes a long time to get going and only really comes to life towards the end, when Zen moves up a gear and plays the chief suspects off against each other from their respective police cells.

I am reliably informed that Michael Dibdin was a great crime writer, so I will go back to the beginning and start again with the first Zen mystery. But this felt mediocre at best.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Excellent
This is my second Aurelio Zen audio book, I find it makes a huge change listening to a book rather than reading it. This audiobook comes on 8 CDs. Read more
Published 29 days ago by Mrs. A. M. Chadwick
Organised chaos
I know, organisation and chaos are mutually exclusive concepts, but this book had elements of both in it. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Molly Davidson
Enjoyable
This is the first audio book I have tried. I was impressed by this. Not only is it a good story, but this is well narrated. I would highly recommend this if it was a bit cheaper..
Published 2 months ago by Dr. W. E. Allen
Disappointing but not too much.
"A long finish" while not the best Zen story I have read was very enjoyable. Having watched the BBC episodes I can put a face to Zen which makes the story more enjoyable for me and... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Wally
another unorthodox assignment
This is a review is for audio CD of the book of the same name

Zen's need to leave Rome lands him in yet another unorthodox assignment: to find evidence that clears the... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Sussman Pro
A wonderfully atmospheric work of murder...
Detective Aurelio Zen is sent into the hinterlands of Italy in order to prove that a man accused of patricide is innocent - whether he is or not. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Christopher Meadows
Zen magic
It's taken me a while to review this audio book as it is 9 hours or so long. I need a lot of car journeys to deal with it. But now that I have, it comes highly recommended. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Michael Watson
Didn't realise it was an audio CD
would have prefered it was a bit clearer that this was a CD. Sure its good, but realy dont have the time to listen to it
Published 9 months ago by Thompson Family
Wine truffles and garlic
Aurelio Ven is sent to the wine country to initially prove an accused is innocent. Quickly this is achieved and he goes on to investigate the murder pitting his wits against wiley... Read more
Published 9 months ago by James I. Wilson
Wine, truffles - and murder!
In this book Venetian Aurelio Zen has been persuaded to go to Piedmont to investigate the murder of a prestigious wine maker. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Wynne Kelly
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Life was not a spectator sport, he told himself. You couldnt opt out, and you couldnt ever be sure of doing the right thing. All you could hope for, perhaps, was to do the wrong thing better, or at least more interestingly. &quote;
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Barolo is the Bach of wine, his host continued. Strong, supremely structured, a little forbidding, but absolutely fundamental. Barbaresco is the Beethoven, taking those qualities and lifting them to heights of subjective passion and pain that have never been surpassed. And Brunello is its Brahms, the softer, fuller, romantic afterglow of so much strenuous excess. &quote;
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