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God's Dog
God's Dog is Diego Marani's first detective novel, introducing Domingo Salazar, a Dominican monk, who is a Vatican secret agent. Italy is now a theocratic state ruled by the Vatican, whose secret agents are dedicated to root out non-believers and heretics. The sanctity of life is being challenged by a cell of dissidents helping sufferers commit euthanasia.
'The crime genre is thronging with honest, likeable cops working within corrupt regimes but the writers of such novels give themselves a get-out-of-jail-free card by allowing us to sympathise with their conflicted protagonists, chafing against their brutal paymasters. Marani (in Judith Landry's able translation), however, is more audacious, granting his anti-hero a terrifying religious fervour, unquestioning of the status quo. What's more, he is an intelligent, intuitive investigator, skilled at using psychology against his victims. Which is what makes the success of this energetic and trenchant novel all the more impressive, however reptilian its protagonist. Marani's church authorities here propose an interfaith movement called "Bible-Koranism" designed to stamp out secularism; as Salazar calmly explains this historical necessity to non-believers, the reader may hear Marani's warning voice: be aware!'
Barry Forshaw in The Independent
'Here, though the terse economy of detective prose works to move events briskly to their violent conclusion. In this Marani is very well served again by Judith Landry's excellent English translation, which captures both the novel's nod to generic conventions of style, and its stranger little flourishes and apercus.'
Bharat Tandon in The Times Literary Supplement
'The crime genre is thronging with honest, likeable cops working within corrupt regimes but the writers of such novels give themselves a get-out-of-jail-free card by allowing us to sympathise with their conflicted protagonists, chafing against their brutal paymasters. Marani (in Judith Landry's able translation), however, is more audacious, granting his anti-hero a terrifying religious fervour, unquestioning of the status quo. What's more, he is an intelligent, intuitive investigator, skilled at using psychology against his victims. Which is what makes the success of this energetic and trenchant novel all the more impressive, however reptilian its protagonist. Marani's church authorities here propose an interfaith movement called "Bible-Koranism" designed to stamp out secularism; as Salazar calmly explains this historical necessity to non-believers, the reader may hear Marani's warning voice: be aware!'
Barry Forshaw in The Independent
'Here, though the terse economy of detective prose works to move events briskly to their violent conclusion. In this Marani is very well served again by Judith Landry's excellent English translation, which captures both the novel's nod to generic conventions of style, and its stranger little flourishes and apercus.'
Bharat Tandon in The Times Literary Supplement
Book Details
- Publisher: Dedalus
- Publish Date: Mar 31st, 2015
- Pages: 146
- Language: English
- Edition: undefined - undefined
- Dimensions: 7.80in - 4.90in - 0.70in - 0.30lb
- EAN: 9781909232518
- Categories: • Literary• Mystery & Detective - General• Thrillers - General
About the Author
Marani, Diego: - Diego Marani was born in Ferrara in 1959. He works as a senior linguist for the European Union in Brussels.
He writes columns for various European newspapers about current affairs in Europanto, a language that he has invented. His collection of short stories in Europanto, Las Adventures des Inspector Cabillot has been published by Dedalus.
In Italian he has published seven novels, including the highly acclaimed New Finnish Grammar and The Last of the Vostyachs and his first detective novel, God's Dog. Dedalus will publish The Interpreter in the USA in 2016.
He writes columns for various European newspapers about current affairs in Europanto, a language that he has invented. His collection of short stories in Europanto, Las Adventures des Inspector Cabillot has been published by Dedalus.
In Italian he has published seven novels, including the highly acclaimed New Finnish Grammar and The Last of the Vostyachs and his first detective novel, God's Dog. Dedalus will publish The Interpreter in the USA in 2016.
Landry, Judith: - Judith Landry was educated at Somerville College, Oxford where she obtained a first class honours degree in French and Italian. She combines a career as a translator of works of fiction, art and architecture with part-time teaching. Her translations for Dedalus are: The House by the Medlar Tree by Giovanni Verga, New Finnish Grammar, God's Dog and The Last of the Vostyachs by Diego Marani, The Mussolini Canal by Antonio Pennacchi, The Devil in Love by Jacques Cazotte, Prague Noir: The Weeping Woman on the Streets of Prague by Sylvie Germain and Smarra & Trilby by Charles Nodier.
Praise for this book
"Landry knows her man inside out, having previously given us English versions of Marani's New Finnish Grammar & The Last of the Vostyachs and she imparts a cool detachment to his catechetical Utopia that lifts it above the merely satirical and makes Domingo's hunt genuinely exciting." -- The Tablet