Product Description

Taking the fire that destroyed the Fenice theatre in 1996 as his starting point, John Berendt creates a unique and unforgettable portrait of Venice and its extraordinary inhabitants. Beneath the exquisite facade of the world's most beautiful historic city, scandal, corruption and venality are rampant, and John Berendt is a master at seeking them out. Ezra Pound and his mistress, Olga; poet Mario Stefani; the Rat Man of Treviso; or Mario Moro -- self-styled carabiniere, fireman, soldier or airman, depending on the day of the week. With his background in journalism, Berendt is perfectly poised to gain access to private and unapproachable people, and persuade them to talk frankly to him. The result is mischievous, witty, compelling - and destined to be the non-fiction succes d'estime of the year.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #429790 in Books
• Published on: 2005-09-27
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 414 pages

About the Author
John Berendt is a journalist and former editor of New York magazine. His first book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, was an international bestseller. He lives in New York.

Customer Reviews

An excellent book - and so different from what you think
Amazing - this book is not at all what one may think one's getting! Maybe one expects a gentle wander through Venice, with the odd anecdote, and of course plenty of historical knowledge served up in an oh so casual manner. In short, like a little book of journalistic appreciation of a beautiful place. One or two readers may even expect it to be an insider's guide to Venice- to which they can then point and say "Oh really, he doesn't understand Venice at all". But read the book, and you'll be flabbergasted! Much like the town he is writing about, Berendt confuses you, sets wrong trails, surprises you and eventually makes you realize you've gone in a huge circle to where you've started out from, only with so much more knowledge and experience. His account of the fate of the Ezra Pound papers for example, is one of the most astounding "real crime" accounts I've read - and of course Berendt manages to spin a web which craftily links it up to Henry James' "Aspern Papers". This is a simply amazing book which leave one gasping at his cunning and elegant way of exploring the dark side of the mysterious town called Venice.

City of Fallen Angels
A book written possibly from an American point of view emphasising the various and ongoing fascination and connections that Americans continue to have with La Serinissima. Nevertheless John Berendt gets under the skin of Venice and its people to such a degree that you feel that if you passed them in the Calle you would immediately recognise them from Archimede Seguso to the man of a hundred identities and uniforms to match.

Whilst your typical Venetian gets quite emotional quite easily on subjects ranging from pigeons in the city to the increasing maritime traffic through the Lagoon, the author does not let it cloud his view of the situation.For example he provides an insight into the fire at la Fenice from a very different slant, including a view from a near neighbours window of the ongoing tragedy, but one I think that captures the effect of this catastrophe on the city and its inhabitants with a closeness that I have not seen in other accounts of the fire.

If you are travelling to Venice do read this book as it will, I believe, make you appreciate the city and its inhabitants with a different view, but one which I believe will get you much closer to what living in Venice is all about. A very good read, however you get the feeling that Mr. Berendt hasn't finished yet with Venice despite everything still captured by the magic of this city?

Entertaining but flawed
City of Falling Angels is essentially a well-written poiece of gossip -- a forum for the rich and famous philanthopists of the Save Venice charity to bite each other's backs by revealing nuggets of juicy scandal for Berendt to re-hash.

He slings hash very well, it has to be said, and is a consistently entertaining gossip-- although for my money the chapter on the problems of the Pound family could have been entirely dispensed with. But the history of the Save Venice Fund is rivetingly good -- even though it has little to do with the fire that consumed Teatro La Fenice

The book only really takes off when the story of the Fenice fire is being pursued and then it becomes very good piece of writing indeed. In fact it could have been even better if Berendt had stuck to the main topic instead of being bedazzled by the inane antics of a small group of self-serving 'philanthropists' and had illuminated the Byzantine history of the fire and the reconstruction more rigorously.

I listened to the book on audio CDs and found it whiled away long and boring car journeys very satisfactorily. But while Berendt is a consummate writer his occasionally arch pronunciation of Italian (or even English) is sometimes distracting to the listener. Readers of course would have no such problems.