A Rich Full Death [Paperback]

"Fruitily atmospheric as a crumbling necropolis with a startling (and hauntingly ambiguous) finale." --The Guardian

"Vigorous and amusing. . .Dibdin convincingly creates the cosmopolitan society of nineteenth-century Florence." --Daily Telegraph

"Clever plotting, witty writing, and a well-judged display of historical background." --The Times (London)

"Dibdin has a gift for shocking the unshockable reader." --Ruth Rendell --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

" Fruitily atmospheric as a crumbling necropolis with a startling (and hauntingly ambiguous) finale." --The Guardian
" Vigorous and amusing. . .Dibdin convincingly creates the cosmopolitan society of nineteenth-century Florence." --Daily Telegraph
" Clever plotting, witty writing, and a well-judged display of historical background." --The Times (London)
" Dibdin has a gift for shocking the unshockable reader." --Ruth Rendell

A thrilling Victorian mystery from the creator of the bestselling Aurelio Zen series --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Florence,1855. " The English are dying too much, " the city's police chief observes. And members of the foreign
community in this quaint Italian backwater, both English and American, are indeed dying at an alarming rate and in an extraordinary variety of ingenious and horrible ways.

With the local authorities out of their depth, the distinguished resident Robert Browning launches his own private investigation, aided and abetted by an expatriot Robert Booth. Unfortunately, their amateur sleuthing is hampered by the fact that each of their suspects becomes the next victim in a series of murders orchestrated by a killer with a taste for poetic justice. A Rich Full Death features characters both historical and imaginary, ranging from an enticing servant girl to Mr. Browning's consumptive, world-famous wife, Elizabeth Barrett, in a tale lush with period detail, intricately plotted, and with a truly astonishing final twist.

Michael Dibdin was born in 1947. He went to school in Northern Ireland, and later to Sussex University and the University of Alberta in Canada. He lived in Seattle. After completing his first novel, The Last Sherlock Holmes Story, in 1978, he spent four years in Italy teaching English at the University of Perugia. His second novel, A Rich Full Death, was published in 1986. It was followed by Ratking in 1988, which won the Gold Dagger Award for the Best Crime Novel of the year and introduced us to his Italian detective - Inspector Aurelio Zen. In 1989 The Tryst was published to great acclaim and was followed by Vendetta in 1990, the second story in the Zen series. Dirty Tricks was published in 1991. Inspector Zen made his third appearance in Cabal, which was published in 1992. The Dying of the Light, an Agatha Christie pastiche, was published in 1993. His fourth Zen novel, Dead Lagoon, was published the following year. His next novel, Dark Spectre, was published in 1995. Two more Zen novels followed: Cosi Fan Tutti, set in Naples, was published in 1996 and A Long Finish was published in 1998. Blood Rain, the seventh Zen novel, was published in 1999. Thanksgiving was published in 2000, with the eighth Zen, And Then You Die, appearing in 2002. Aurelio Zen returned in Medusa, in August 2003, and then again in Back to Bologna in 2005. His last novel, End Games, was published posthumously in July 2007.