The Age of Doubt (Salvù Montalbano, #14)

The Age of Doubt (Inspector Montalbano #14)

3.76 of 5 stars 3.76  ·  rating details  ·  582 ratings  ·  112 reviews
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Potter's Field,winner of the Crime Writers' Association's International Dagger Award and longlisted for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize

With their dark sophistication and dry humor, Andrea Camilleri's hugely popular Sicilian crime novels continue to win more and more fans in America. The day after a storm, Inspector Montalb...more
Paperback, 288 pages
Published May 29th 2012 by Penguin Books (first published October 23rd 2008)
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Seth
“The Age of Doubt,” which is #14 in the Inspector Montalbano series, is one of the best. Andrea Camilleri does a masterful job employing his characteristic story-telling techniques.

The just-released translation by Stephen Santarelli inspired Tom Nolan to publish a wonderful review of the Montalbano series in the Wall Street Journal: “Sicily’s Most Exquisitely Tormented Detective,” June 15, 2012, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001.... Nolan highlights one particular literary technique that cr...more
Anita
Inspector Montalbano is caught in a traffic jam as he leaves for work. The road has been washed out and he rescues a young woman who's car is in peril. He takes her back to his home, a short walk away, and discovers her name is Vanna Digiulio, and that she is awaiting the arrival of her aunt's yacht which bears her name, Vanna. He lets her wait in the police station and offers her a novel in order to pass the time. A short time later, Montalbano is called to the harbour where a body has been rec...more
Ann Sloan
Inspector Salvo Montalbano loves food, particularly pasta and seafood, and living in Sicily, he doesn’t have to go far to find it. Plus, his housekeeper Adelina is an excellent cook. I always feel like I have gained ten pounds when I read one of the books in this series. I was lucky enough to have visited Florence and Siena and loved the pizza and gelato, but now I want to visit Sicily and eat mussels, sole, shrimp, sea urchins, clams, calamari, olives, anchovies, cheeses, and breads, the pastas...more
Arwen56
Sebbene sia un’estimatrice di Camilleri (e non solo del Camilleri di “Montalbano”), questo romanzo mi ha lasciata un po’ perplessa e, sinceramente, non lo trovo molto riuscito. Condivido molte delle critiche che gli sono state mosse da altri utenti di aNobii.

Ad esempio, concordo con Jestercap sul fatto che l’uso del dialetto siciliano sia decisamente aumentato e che questo non giochi a favore delle fluidità espressiva. Se, all’inizio, il mix tra italiano e siciliano era ben calibrato, ora lo sbi...more
Nancy Oakes
Absolutely loved it; but then again, I'm a HUGE fan of the series.

As with many of the recent books in the series, Age of Doubt begins with a dream -- in this one, Montalbano walks into the station to let Catarella know he'll be away on a surprise trip to visit Livia in Bocadesse. Catarella responds that Salvo can't go to Bocadesse because he died the day before. He's also told he can't investigate the case because "he's too personally involved." Even worse, Livia's not sure she can make it to t...more
Sara
Not my favorite Montalbano, 3.5 stars really, it's just uneven. The plot is not quite as dense as in some of the early books, and the subordinate characters not quite as colorful. Or maybe they're getting predictable? Some parts are quite good however!
Anyhow, a new love affair for Salvú and I will not tell you how it turns out...
Some have remarked on Salvú's profanity, occasional meanness, duplicity in fleeing the bureaucracy and the woman who tries to own him...all character flaws which he woul...more
Joyce Lagow
When Commisario Salvo Montalbano first arrived on the scene, he was a 48 year old volatile Chief Inspector stationed in Vigata, Sicily. His relationship with Livia, who lived in Genoa, had been going on for some years. Montalbano himself was a vigorous, self-confident man at the peak of his powers--and something of a gourmand.

In this latest book, 10 years later Montalbano is approaching 60. He's still in Vigata, he's still a gourmand, eating at Da Enzo's, he’s still involved with Livia. But. The...more
Dale
Montalbano is still moving through the five stages of grief over his advancing years (now well into his 50s) - arriving somewhere between bargaining and depression. He is a much more subdued character than previously, not as irascible and demanding, nor as unpredictable. He still harbors the hope that he can be his younger self, but his doubts interfere.

In this installment he investigates the murder of a victim who had been mutilated after death to disguise his identity and left to drift at sea....more
Ubik 2.0
Noi assidui lettori di Camilleri/Montalbano siamo ben consapevoli che in ogni suo romanzo la vicenda poliziesca non riveste importanza maggiore rispetto al minuzioso quadro d'ambiente che si dipana intorno agli avvenimenti: da una parte i nuovi caratteri e le nuove location che caratterizzano ogni episodio, dall'altra l'evolversi (o il confermarsi) dei personaggi che abitano stabilmente queste storie, primo fra tutti ovviamente Salvo Montalbano, i componenti del commissariato di Vigata e poi tut...more
Tony
THE AGE OF DOUBT. (2012). Andrea Camilleri. ****.
Inspector Montalbano is stuck in his car behind a long line of other cars – not moving. When he gets out to see what is happening, he finds that the lead car is hanging over a chasm that had formed when the road washed away. He finds that there is a young woman in the car. He gets her to get out because of the danger and has her sit in his car until help comes. He learns that her name is Vanna, and that she is in town to meet a yacht that her cou...more
Carol
The Montalbano mysteries are funny and dark and full of food. Montalbano himself can be a jerk, but he's amusing, intelligent but crass. The mystery here, who was the corpse and who killed him, was well-done, enough twists to keep me interested and a timely theme. The recurring secondary characters are a little cardboardish, but still likeable. Based on those things, I would rate this closer to a 4, probably.

The problem, and the reason this book had me complaining out loud - Laura. She works for...more
Shannon
I am so hooked on Inspector Montalban and his group of investigators. The last few stories have focused on Salvo and his pre-occupation with not only his aging but lovely women that cross his path. I am not a fan of the morally casual approach to infidelity (mostly with Mimi's character since Salvo isn't married but still . . . ) but that's pretty much my only complaint. This story focuses on a couple of yachts that have anchored in port and there's a dead body or two that may or may not have an...more
Gloria Feit
The books in the Inspector Montalbano series usually are lighthearted stories about the Sicilian detective combined with a mystery for him to solve. However, while in this novel he does have a mystery to solve, this entry reflects more of his introspection. The contrasts are intriguing, to say the least. It begins when the Inspector rescues a bespectacled, rather mousy woman whose car is about to be swallowed into a chasm, or sinkhole, created in a collapsed road. She tells him she’s the niece o...more
Claudia
Come al solito non posso dare meno di quattro stelline a un romanzo con protagonista Montalbano, ormai non è più un commissario immaginato da Camilleri, è un mio amico, un mio coinquilino, un mio ipotetico compagno di bevute. Provo affetto per quest'uomo perennemente in crisi di mezz'età, provo un irrefrenabile impulso di andare in Sicilia, non solo perchè è una terra meravigliosa ma anche perchè è lì che sono ambientate tutte le sue indagini. Questa volta Salvo si trova alle prese con un cadave...more
Paola
Montalbano si trova a nuotare in acque perigliose assai. Innamoramento e amore. Ma che fare quando lui ha 58 anni e lei é una picciotta bellissima?
E Montalbano non sa che fare.
Sono intense le riflessioni in merito al lasciarsi andare a questo sentimento, anzi passione.
Siam sicuri che sia amore? e non un patetico tentativo di riacchiappare gli ultimi scampoli di gioventù, di voler provare quell'intensità dell'essere e del vivere che pareva oramai lasciata alle spalle per un'esistenza fatta di ce...more
Karmakosmik
Ho un bel ricordo della versione televisiva di questa nuova indagine di Montalbano, con ospite la Ragonese nei panni del tenente Belladonna. Camilleri continua ad incentrare il proprio scritto sui pensieri interiori di Montalbano, tralasciando quasi del tutto la parte investigativa (l'indagine è poco più che un pretesto). Al centro dei pensieri di Montalbano adesso c'è l'amore, o cmq qualcosa di simile che il nostro amato commissario fatica a descrivere o a comprendere. Il primo incontro a casa...more
Marilyn
I was so excited to find a new Camilleri but was disappointed in the product -- it was not his best. The story was contrived and the writing lackluster. I have enjoyed all thirteen of his wonderful mysteries featuring Inspector Montalbano just as I have enjoyed the Italian movies with subtitles which are so true to the books. The plots are humorous and biting at times. The characters well drawn and the reader loves and finds the main character annoying depending upon his mood and treatment of ot...more
Lavecchiastrega
E veniamo a noi, caro Salvo!
I tuoi 58 anni si fanno sentire, hai perso la freschezza, gli incubi notturni ti visitano, la tua relazione è in coma vegetativo, i tuoi sottoposti cominciano a irrigidirsi nei loro caratteri.
Tuttavia, continuo ad amarti ♥.
Sempre e comunque, senza se e senza ma!
Amo il tuo autore per tutto quello che ci ha donato nel tempo, lo ringrazio per averci presentato tanti tipi umani.
Il tempo che viviamo non è più quello delle risate spensierate e tu, Salvo mio, con il tuo nirb...more
Debbie
it was ok - 'required' reading for my book club- I suspect that coming into the middle of the series might be part of the problem..after all it would be hard to pick up on Rebus in the 10th Rankin novel.

But I felt the book moved in chops - like the translation was stilted and while I enjoyed Inspector Montabano's salty language - he was so sexist and unpleasant in his attitude toward women that I found that to be a turn off. He seemed like such a grouchy old man but maybe he is like the author -...more
Felicity
I found Andrea Camilleri's latest installment in the Inspector Montalbano series Camilleri's most disappointing. The unconsumated affair with Laura (and its tragic ending) was never quite convincing; the love affair between the two characters seemed the raison d'etre of the novel rather than the mystery surrounding blood diamonds that lurked in the background; blood diamonds as a plot device are kind of passe (surely?); and even the descriptions of Montalbano's usual repasts did little to lighte...more
Tony
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
Mary Stevens

The Age of Doubt. I read it in English, of course, but there was no Goodreads entry in English. This is another masterful Camilleri mystery starring the wonderful Inspector Montalbano with all the trimmings. I feel that I am really there, in Sicilly, tasting the food, feeling the breeze, listening to Catarelli mangle his sentences, getting inside the head of the introspective hero. I've read every book in the series and this is probably the best. Touches issues of immigration from north Africa,...more
Melodie Campbell
I adore Andrea Camilleri's Inspector Montalbano series. In fact, Montalbano is top of my list of fictional characters I wouldn't kick out of bed. So men; if you're looking for an idea of what the modern, intelligent, mature woman finds sexy in a man...
But I digress. Camilleri writes a fast moving, extremely intelligent mystery. I am a crime author myself, and I run a national crime writing association. I am ALWAYS left guessing 'til the end in a Montalbano story. This is rare, believe me.
Transla...more
Nancy
I am currently on the waiting list for 13 books at my local library but with "nothing to read" I found myself browsing the "new" section looking for a mystery to tide me over. This one appeared promising. A police procedural with Italian cops sounded both familiar and different. I gave it a go.

As it turned out the main focus of the narrative was the ongoing personal conflicts and temptations of the detective. As the 14th book in a series, someone who follows Inspector Montalbano might really enj...more
Ivonne Rovira
An outing with Inspector Salvo Montalbano is always enjoyable, always laugh-out-loud funny. However, the good inspector is becoming more and more curmudgeonly and his treatment of his long-suffering long-distance girlfriend, Livia -- Madre Santa! -- grows more and more despicable.

Despite these flaws and the unrealistically sentimentalized ending, I'm glad I read The Age of Doubt, and I'm hoping translator Stephen Sartorelli hurries up to translate the backlog of Andrea Camilleri's novels.
Spuddie
A typically short and sweet visit to Italy with Inspector Montalbano, full of yummy food descriptions and plenty of crime and criminals as a side dish. LOL I think Montalbano is getting soft as he ages--he definitely seems more sensitive and less curmudgeonly than he did at the beginning of the series. I'm not sure I like that so much!

This is the first time I listened to a book in the series rather than read it, so it was interesting to hear the reader doing Catarella's voice--it sounded exactl...more
Pat
Almost every Inspector Montalbano mystery from Camillieri is a good book. This one is a quite a bit above average. Of course, it involves a woman, as the best Montalbano mysteries, do. Actually, it involves several women and a yacht and, of course, dead bodies. And it's Sicily so there is also, of course, the wonderful descriptions of food and the slight digs at carabinieri and other law enforcement members. This time Lydia is mostly out of the picture and Montalbano gets almost too involved - m...more
Skip
Published this year, the newest Inspector Montalbano series starts his rescue of a young woman, whose car is perched over a washed out road and her story of meeting a fancy yacht belonging to her aunt. When the yacht finally arrives, it has brought a dead body with a destroyed face killed by poison. Montalbano then has his usual feelings about a younger woman, a lieutenant from the port police. With the assistance of his nemesis pathologist, he figures out that the victim is someone else and unr...more
Susan
It's almost pointless to describe the plot of this book. As it is for most of this series, the charm and interest comes from spending time with Inspector Montalbano as he goes about his daily routine, eating lunch at his favorite restaurant, talking his after-meal walk, trying to resolve his attraction for a new woman in his life while he is still attached, as he has been for many years, to a woman who lives on the mainland. I believe someone once wrote a Mme. Maigret cookbook; why doesn't someo...more
Margaret
This has been my favorite so far of the Montalbano mysteries. They are all a delightful view into Sicilian life and food... but this one dealt so humorously with the human frailty of our favorite inspector that I was especially charmed. Montalbano's instincts lead him to investigate a death that might have not looked like murder and by continuing to follow his instincts and pull threads out of the fray, he uncovers a much more malicious plot underlying it all.
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Lt. Belladonna 1 8 Nov 03, 2012 07:56am  
L'età del dubbio (Paperback)
The Age of Doubt (Kindle Edition)
The Age of Doubt (Kindle Edition)
The Age of Doubt (Hardcover)
La edad de la duda (Paperback)

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Andrea Camilleri (born september 6, 1925 in Porto Empedocle) is an Italian writer. He is considered one of the greatest Italian writers of both 20th and 21st centuries.

Originally from Porto Empedocle, Sicily, Camilleri began studies at the Faculty of Literature in 1944, without concluding them, meanwhile publishing poems and short stories. Around this time he joined the Italian Communist Party.

Fro...more
More about Andrea Camilleri...
The Shape of Water (Salvú Montalbano, #1) The Terra-Cotta Dog (Salvú Montalbano #2) Voice of the Violin (Salvú Montalbano, #4) The Snack Thief (Salvú Montalbano, #3) Excursion to Tindari (Salvú Montalbano, #5)

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