Back to Bologna

Aurelio Zen #10

by Michael Dibdin

In the latest installment in his critically acclaimed Italian mystery series, Michael Didbin sends Aurelio Zen to Italy’s culinary capital, Bologna, where he discovers that some cases are not quite what they appear to be.

When the corpse of the shady Bologna industrialist who owns the local football team is found both shot and stabbed with a Parmesan knife, Aurelio Zen is summoned to oversee the investigation. Anxious for a break from his girlfriend, who attributes Zen’s slow recovery from routine surgery to hypochondria, he is only too happy to take on what first appears to be an undemanding assignment. The case quickly spins out of control, becoming entangled with the fates of a student semiotics, a mysterious immigrant claiming to be royalty, and Bologna’s most incompetent private detective. Meanwhile a prominent postmodern academic accuses Italy’s leading celebrity chef of being a fraud. Back to Bologna is dazzlingly plotted and delivers both comic and serious insights into the realities of today’s Italy.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Italy, Zen, Italian Literature, Detective

223 pages, Paperback

First published August 4, 2005

About the author

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.

Dibdin was married three times, most recently to the novelist K. K. Beck. His death in 2007 followed a short illness.

Series:
* Aurelio Zen

Reviews

[Eric_W · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you like Aurelio Zen novels, this book might disappoint you. If you enjoy Michael Dibdin, you’ll love this story. Aurelio is really just a peripheral character. He’s recovering from surgery and trying to fix his relationship with Jenna. (Reading some of the earlier novels first would be useful.) Dibdin’s goal in this wickedly funny and cynical view of Italian academia and upper crust is to skewer the phoniness of the elites and famous. Lots of in jokes including a hidden appearance of Umberto Eco disguised as Eduardo Ugo as a semiotics professor which gives you an idea of Dibdin’s humor.

I suggest reading some of the earlier books in the series and Googling “Ruritania.” The crime is irrelevant and plays second fiddle to Dibdin’s irreverent look at Italiana and gentle spoofing of Italian detective stories. Dibdin has a way with words that often brings a smile to one’s face.

[Leslie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A few random thoughts, which I will hopefully put into some sort of coherent form of review soon:
I am getting a little frustrated that Zen can't ever be in a happy relationship. I was worried about how things progressed in the book in which Gemma was introduced in book #8 - "And Then You Die" - and I find myself distracted from the mystery at hand with worrying about how that situation will resolve.

The mystery in this book reminded me somewhat of "The Long Finish" in that I felt neither of them had a very satisfying conclusion. Dibdin seems to be writing this mystery as if he was a postmodernist himself. Being a fan of the Golden Age mystery, I don't want an inconclusive ending in which varying meanings can be found -- I want a culprit who is tracked down by the detective and caught!

I loved the characters in this book: Ugo (the postmodern academic novelist) who is a thinly disguised portrait of Umberto Eco & his graduate student Rudolfo, whose girlfriend claims her name is Flavia and to be from Ruritania (!); the TV celebrity chef who can't cook but loves to sing (and do drugs); and the P.I. who acts as if he is in a book by Dashiell Hammett.

[Mitch · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rocketing through the Zen series, and we're almost at the end. While I enjoyed Back to Bologna, I find myself unsure whether Dibdin was bored of Zen by this point, or whether he had become so comfortable with the character that he felt free to play some writer's games. (I won't spoil it for you, but let's just say the book is pretty meta.) It will come as no surprise that the setting for this novel is Bologna, although the geography is less important in this book than key characters - a parody of Umberto Eco, an opera-singing TV chef (presumably also based on a real person, although not one I recognized), and a football hooligan. The mystery is satisfying and convoluted, although again the dénouement to some extent comes out of nowhere with a two-page exposition near the end. And Zen is again far from the central character and back in tragicomic hapless mode. Still, good fun, and I'm a bit surprised to see two-star ratings here.

At this point, I guess I can freely say I am somewhat disappointed with character evoluton over the series. With each novel I feel like I'm seeing a portrait painted by a completely different artist, recognizable as much by the label as by the subject itself. Although maybe I just didn't see the true Zen at the beginning.

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my first Dibdin experience, and while I enjoyed the mystery, Donna Leon is still my first love when it comes to Italian mystery novels. The detective in this series, Aurelio Zen, has a bit too many flaws to be a sympathetic protagonist, but the colorful descriptions of Lucca and Bologna made me want to break out the Chianti and Pesto and whip up one of Lo Chef's famous dishes (a character in the novel).

[Brick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enormously funny, as the ever cynical Dibdin pokes fun at post-post modernism, overblown celebrity of several kinds, and the corrupt culture of celebrity in these various fields, while using with great humour the time honored and very convoluted device of mistaken identity, with nods to Shakespeare and others (so that we can not fail to miss them) late in the book. The use of overblown characters well illustrates the outrageous reality of these basically foolish cultures, and holds them up to mockery, the mockery in a bitter-sweet fashion extending even to the protagonist. I wonder, not for the first time in reading this series of Zen novels, whether the dysfunctional relationships that Aurelio keeps building for himself are not too well understood by the author. For me, the many references to the very observable follies makes the whole novel extremely enjoyable, not so much as mystery or police procedural, but as social commentary, thus 5 stars!

[Monica · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a cast of characters - the drug and testosterone fuelled student son of a wealthy and bad tempered attorney, his roommate, an earnest student of semiotics who is losing patience with his prima donna professor, the roommate's girlfriend, an immigrant from - she says - Ruritania who is studying Italian by reading Prisoner of Zenda over and over. Then there is the inept private eye hired by the attorney to keep track of his son, a Camel smoking, bourbon drinking wannabe Yankee. And the professor, an egomaniac author in love with his own cleverness, who goes off on long, hilarious, operatic riffs of deconstructionist bafflegab. And the hot TV chef who can't cook but can and does sing and also does coke - a lot of coke.

There is a body, the much hated owner of the local football club, shot and stabbed with a parmesan knife, and an attempted shooting of the professor. There is a catastrophic televised cooking contest between the professor and the chef. There are red herrings aplenty, just not on the menu.

Zen, recovering from surgery and trying to figure out his love life, is sent to Bologna as a Band Aid to keep an eye on the politicized murder investigation. Mostly he is moaning about the wretched food and hanging out with other cops (whose names are swaps of those of the fictional detectives created by Donna Leon and Magdalen Nabb).

The crimes do get solved, not by any action of Zen's by almost by happenstance and observation. It's wonderfully clever writing and plotting, keen social satire and thoroughly enjoyable.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some very funny bits indeed as a cynical world weary Zen looks for an easier life. A really nice contrast to the usual crime fiction trope where the hero or heroine always just can't stop giving a damn. This and the authors light touch make this a very enjoyable read. Oh and the diss of umberto eco. Especially the diss of eco.

[Hilary · Rating 2 out of 5]

With a cast of unlikeable characters, a disjointed plot, an unsatisfactory ending and a writing style that irritated me intensely, Back to Bologna is my worst read of the year so far. The only enjoyment I derived whilst reading it was in spotting Dibdin’s many adverb/adjective combos - in the end I made a game out of it in order to stop myself getting annoyed. Here are a just a few examples: slyly pugnacious, bombastically jokey, menacingly turgid, intimidatingly regular, exuberantly filthy.

[Mark Green · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite entertaining mystery novel. To be honest I read this at a holiday let as you do, one of the books at the apartment. Found it entertaining and amusing and would certainly look for other books in this series.

[Kat V · Rating 1 out of 5]

Are these even mysteries anymore? They’ve completely lost their way. I feel like these books have turned into some weird kind of therapy about how the author can’t sustain relationships.

[Benjamin Fasching-Gray · Rating 5 out of 5]

Zen takes a back seat to a set of funny characters including a coked up celebrity chef and a thinly veiled parody of Umberto Eco! Bravo!

[Kathy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Now, here is what I think about Michael Dibdin's Zen novels.

Dibdin has created a main character who is neither credible nor likable nor interesting. He may have mitigated this problem in the early novels of the series by convoluted plotting, but eventually he ran out of ideas, or got bored, and then utilised the rather lazy smokescreen of (a) a kaleidoscope of geographical settings (all of which were ideal holiday destinations for his English readers) and (b) silly jokes and increasingly farcical plots.

Back to Bologna is a great example of this. The plot is ridiculous and Zen's participation in it is pretty much peripheral.

What perhaps annoys me most of all is the arrogance and rudeness of the writer who uses a foreign country as a setting for his work for the sole purpose of mocking that country. Really, Mr Dibdin, the only country that an Englishman should be mocking is England. Anything else is a piece of supreme bad manners. The guest should not mock the home of his host.

On page 217 of this book, Dibdin gives an exceedingly thin excuse for the plot of this novel. How irritating that he fully recognised that this book is a lame parody and yet still insulted his readers by submitting it to his publisher. I read that he died two years after the publication of this book. From shame?

[Evelyn Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was a bit disappointed in this book. I had seen the Masterpiece Mystery PBS series about Aurelio Zen, the Italian Police Inspector. It was very entertaining. The book, Back to Bologna, was confusing with way too many characters and plot lines. Some of the plot lines were just plain silly while
others were more serious. It's the first book I read by this author, but, I don't expect that I will read and more.

[Marion Tucker · Rating 3 out of 5]

I always enjoy these Italian detective novels and this was no different. However I felt there were some issues that went unresolved (I can't go into too much detail in case I give away anything). One in particular was Zen's own personal relationship, however I know there is one more book to come so maybe it gets resolved there.

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting Italian mystery in the Aurelio Zen series with some great satire on semiotics, reality TV, and people in general. Even some self-referential humor. Zen's personal life is as dysfunctional as usual.

[Suzanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had a little trouble getting into this book, but once I did I enjoyed it. The writing is witty and the plot is clever. Maybe I need to start at the beginning of the Aurelio Zen series to get a full appreciation of the character.

[Klaus Mattes · Rating 2 out of 5]

Als der englische Autor von italienischen Provinzkrimis um den oft düpierten Polizisten Zen damit anfing, einen auf Commedia dell'Arte zu machen, obwohl ich ihn mir als einen humorlosen Mann vorstellte, stieg ich aus. Damals in den 1990-er Jahren. Dabei fand ich das ursprünglich so genial: dieser geschiedene Muttersohn aus Venedig, Aurelio Zen, der es fertigbringt, überall mit der italienischen Bürokratie und den geheimen Strippenziehern zusammenzukrachen, und der darum von Buch zu Buch von einer italienischen Provinz zur anderen versetzt wird, also immer wieder neu fremd ist, immer wieder neu aneckt. (Ein wenig wie Wolf Haas' Simon Brenner, aber Aurelio Zen war vorher da, wobei ich das allseits gelobte Erste „Ratking“ (Umbrien) allein schon wegen der ungustiösen Mordmethode nie recht mochte.)

Der Deutsche hat ja traditionell seine Sehnsucht nach dem dolce Vita Italiens, versteht allerdings das viele Gerede, die Mauscheleien und die augenzwinkernd geduldeten Schlampereien nicht wirklich. Das jetzt mal von einem offenkundig journalistisch geschulten „Schiedsrichter“, einem Briten, beschrieben zu bekommen, schien instruktiv. Dibdin schenkte sich und uns den üblichen Kitsch mit Amore, kaltgepresstem Olivenöl, Tiramisu, Raffael-Engelchen und „Maria, ihm schmeckt's nicht“ und befasste sich dafür mit ewigen Faschisten und ewigen Kommunisten, Industriegranden, zubetonierten Vorstädten und Stränden, geschmierten Politikern, Trivialfernsehen und der Kirche als Finanzinstitut. Doch dann kam „Così fan tutti“, die Farce aus Neapel, der Ofen war aus bei mir. Und das war erst das fünfte von insgesamt elf Aurelio-Zen-Mysterys. (Das sechste, „Schwarzer Trüffel“, Piemont, in dem es mehr um gefälschten Wein als um Trüffel geht, englisch: „A Long Finish“, muss ich wohl vorher schon gelesen haben. Das ging eigentlich noch. Aber, o Gott, diese Alberei in Neapel mit den sich über Kreuz betrügenden Ehepaaren, nein, bitte, wenn man nicht komisch ist, soll man nicht so tun!)

Viele Jahre später versuchte ich es dann doch noch mal mit „Roter Marmor“ („And Then You Die“). Das ist das Buch, in dem er mit dieser Gemma zusammengeht, die ihm nun auch in diesem Abenteuer wieder wie ein Mühlstein am Hals hängt. Gemma kann man nicht mögen und Aurelio ist allmählich ein verbrauchter, alter Depp, dem man die Flügel gestutzt hat. Wenn man als Autor seinen eigenen Serienhelden nicht mehr mag, sollte man vielleicht andere Bücher schreiben, statt ihn vor aller Augen nach und nach abzuwracken!

An sich macht „Back to Bologna“ gespannt. Bologna ist schließlich eine tolle alte Kulturstadt, nicht zu nördlich, nicht zu südlich. Zwei Karikaturen von sehr prominenten Italienern (unter geänderten Namen) werden angekündigt: Umberto Eco als eitler Medienfeingeist und Radfahrer. Luciano Pavarotti als übergewichtiger Opernstar, der sich in einer Kommerzfernsehen-Kochshow versucht, in der er den singenden Koch gibt.

Dazu noch Korruption im Profifußball, rechtsradikale Fußballfans, ein Reichensöhnchen, das mit einer linken Studentin aus dem ärmsten Land Europas rummacht (ebenfalls umbenannt). Und der neue rechte Neoliberalismus-Geist, wie er die Medien und Ämter und Parlamentssitze kapert, Berlusconi und Fini. Und vielleicht ein Serienkiller oder Terrorist. Und Zen, der ständig die falschen Schlüsse zieht, aber die Lösung, oder jedenfalls: eine „akzeptable Lösung“ fällt ihm in den Schoß. Und eben die schwer erträgliche Gemma, die sich aus der Toskana herüber an seine Fersen heftet, samt Schwiegermutter, um ihn in ihren Pantoffel zurückzustopfen. (Im achten Buch haben sie gemeinsam einen Menschen umgebracht, jetzt wissen sie zu viel.)

Es wollte wieder so dermaßen viel Farce und Satire werden, als würde Dibdin das schöne Land Italien und seine inkonsequenten Menschen bloß noch verachten. (Aber muss man denn über sie schreiben, wenn sie einen dermaßen nerven?) Und die ganze Zeit dachte ich, das Buch sah so dünn aus, mein Gott, wie will er dann alles das, was er jetzt schon angefangen hat, je noch zu einer einzigen Geschichten zusammenbringen, die auch noch Mordkrimi ist, zu jeder Nebenhandlung einen passablen Schluss erfinden. Ich muss leider sagen: Er tut das nicht. Als es nur noch Gewurschtel, Kuddelmuddel ist, lässt er es gnadenlos fallen. Er würgt es ab. Er peitscht es einem hohlen Schluss zu, als hätte es diese Ankündigungen für Geschichten aus Fußballstadien, Universitäten, Restaurants, dörflichen Polizeiwachen, Ministerien in Rom, gewissenlosen Fernsehaufsteigern nie gegeben. (Ach wisst ihr was, ich bin dann mal weg.)

[Dorothy · Rating 1 out of 5]

The story opens with a corpse (always a good start for a murder mystery) - but not before we've been treated to amusing(???) character studies of the two cops who find the body. I embarked on the second chapter, expecting our hero detective to start investigating - but no. Instead we get a character study of our hero detective, feeling sorry for himself on a train.

Third chapter - a character study of some guy called Rodolfo. Fourth chapter - character study of Zen's girlfriend. Fifth - character study of some Pavarotti-lookalike chef and his manager. Sixth - character study of a private detective. Seventh - FINALLY! - Zen is instructed to investigate the murder. We're on our way at last! Oh, no, we're not. Chapter Eight - character study of a professor.

I know that when you have a murder mystery, you need to introduce all the suspects, but this is ridiculous. I could see the character studies were meant to be humorous, but I didn't find them that funny, and I was irritated by the fact that nothing was actually happening. The final straw was finding myself impatient and annoyed with Aurelio Zen . What's the point of reading the book if I don't like the lead character?

Maybe the book gets better later on, but I will never know.

[Catherine Wojtkun · Rating 2 out of 5]

Expected more, but an easy read. The Italian way of doing things is easier to understand if you have traveled there because parts of the story seem outlandish, but, in truth, are the way things are handled in Italy. Good book to read before going to sleep.



In the latest installment in his critically acclaimed Italian mystery series, Michael Didbin sends Aurelio Zen to Italy’s culinary capital, Bologna, where he discovers that some cases are not quite what they appear to be.

When the corpse of the shady Bologna industrialist who owns the local football team is found both shot and stabbed with a Parmesan knife, Aurelio Zen is summoned to oversee the investigation. Anxious for a break from his girlfriend, who attributes Zen’s slow recovery from routine surgery to hypochondria, he is only too happy to take on what first appears to be an undemanding assignment. The case quickly spins out of control, becoming entangled with the fates of a student semiotics, a mysterious immigrant claiming to be royalty, and Bologna’s most incompetent private detective. Meanwhile a prominent postmodern academic accuses Italy’s leading celebrity chef of being a fraud. Back to Bologna is dazzlingly plotted and delivers both comic and serious insights into the realities of today’s Italy

[Vic Lauterbach · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very entertaining novel that includes two fatal shootings, but it's more of a comedic thriller than a murder mystery. Once again, I started a series in the middle which I keep promising myself not to do. After watching the TV series, I was curious about the novels, but this is the only one my local library has, so my only other option was buying book #1. I decided to read #10 to see if the series was worth it. Pardon the digression. Considering I skipped nine previous books, I was pleased that I didn't find the references to past events confusing or distracting. Once Zen starts his investigation, things go well. The case takes him all over, and its various threads provide plenty of action and suspense, but Zen isn't on center stage much. How much you enjoy this novel depends on your opinion of detective novels that focus on lots of characters other than the detective. I don't mind them, and Mr. Dibdin brings them all to life without making the book drag. A good novel overall, in spite of considerable complexity, it's just an average mystery. Mildly recommended.

[wally · Rating 3 out of 5]

finished 6th february 2023 good read three stars i liked it kindle library loaner first from dibdin and a bit confusing as dibdin does not use breaks between scenes simply on to the next paragraph and i had to back up the first two three times trying to figure out what the hay happened. once i grew accustomed to no space between scenes i was able to make heads or tails of it all. quote a few o! henry! moments in this one, comedic relief, too and me confused trying to juggle the gun, the jacket, the man with no eyebrows. at least on the next one i assume i'll read from dibdin i'll be ready for the scene shifts and go with the flow. somehow...i clicked on "add audible" while....while reading the last one actually, le carre's story. so i eliminated any payments card at amazon as i think that happened the time before, as well...though the payment was canceled. should log into my account and see if i can cancel this one...thirty-one friggin bucks fifty...was that right? schietz!

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Light, Comic, Opera.

Zen takes a trip, falls in-and-out-and-in love with his girlfriend, "audit's" a murder case in Bologna while recuperating from surgery. The rest of the cast is made up largely of older self-absorbed buffoons (a drug-addled TV chef who can't cook; a private-eye trying to mimic a 1940's gumshoe; an academically brilliant but emotionally bankrupt professor/author; a construction contractor who can't decide if he want's his son to succeed in college or come home to work for him; and a pompous lawyer keeping tabs on his wayward son,) a trio of college age characters at the heart of the crimes with assorted TV crew and cops fluttering at the fringes.

Once again, without much effort, Zen is in the right place at the right time in order for at least some of the crimes to be solved to his credit.

Fun, but not Dibdin's best.

[Darius Ostrowski · Rating 2 out of 5]

It took me a long time to get through this, because this really isn't a typical Aurelio Zen mystery, or a conventional mystery at all.

It's a farce, a silly story skewing celebrity chefs, pompous academics, Italian politics, Zen's own relationship with Gemma, soccer supporters/hooligans as well as the wealthy team owners, and Italian society as a whole. I'm sure much of the humor went over my head, and Mr. Dibdin did bring all of his random strings together in the end quite deftly, but not what I was expecting from an Aurelio Zen mystery.

Hopefully the last Zen story will get back to his roots.

[Marilyn]

A hilarious satire where all action keeps coming back to the Cafe Carozzo in Bologna. Inspector Aurelio Zen is in the dumps with his girlfriend Gemma. As he proceeds to deal with that, a series of crimes unfolds with a crazy cast of characters: an annoying private eye, a cocky know-it-all student with a criminal roommate (with a football jacket that keeps cropping up in the plot), a pretentious academic who gets shot in the butt, and a celebrity chef who sings but cannot cook. Somehow, I am reminded of the operatic touch of Canadian writer Robertson Davies, an author very familiar with academic foibles.

[Eruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't do this book justice, reading on vacation when there were countless interruptions. In particular, any intricacies of the plot were likely lost on me. Maybe that's why I was chiefly impressed by the writing and the character development. Aurelio Zen is not a 'manly' character; he is intelligent and sensitive, burdened by his beliefs, thoughts and feelings. Dibdin is a fine writer and I should check out one of his other books, not about Zen, to see what he achieves when not limited by the series.

[M. O'Gannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Back to Bologna – An Aurelio Zen Mystery – Published 2005 - **** - This is my first Dibdin novel, it won’t be my last. Zen is supposedly an incompetent police investigator living in Italy. A lot of the setting and colloquialism reflects the setting. Some of the country flavor honestly went right over my head. But that didn’t affect the enjoyment of the book. Zen has been out of action due to a surgery that has him off his feed at the start of the book. Dibdin provides lots of color and humor. Police procedural is definitely light. But added all up, it was a fun read.

[Lynn Gainer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always a dazzling fast passed plot with comic relief. Dobson is fun to be in Italy with!

Very clever. A leading TV chef, is accused, rightly so, of being a fraud
Zen’s recuperation from a recent surgery has his live in Emma at her wits end
Thinking his latest assignment will be easy he yet again becomes embroiled in a messy investigation
A lawyers son in trouble and the most incompetent private eye in all of Italy makes for a fun read

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first Aurelio Zen book and it was thoroughly enjoyable. Not a traditional crime narrative; more like a crime farce with larger than life, virtually cartoon characters. I find crime novels often have quite unrealistic coincidences popping up and spoiling the authenticity for me. Here there is a heap of unrealistic coincidences which just make the whole thing so much better. I perhaps understand why some readers might be disappointed in the book. But it made me laugh and I find it hard to laugh nowadays.

[Miki Jacobs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another darkly comic Zen mystery. Zen is sent to Bologna after the despised owner of the football team is murdered. He is glad to go as Gemma and he aren't currently seeing eye to eye. In his usual style he stumbles across more than he bargained for.

I enjoyed this, the ramblings of Ugo got on my nerves a little, but it was all part of his character so bearable

[Janet Panter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first Aurelio Zen book I picked up, so somewhat out of sequence but I enjoyed it. Was the mention of Brunetti a nod to Donna Leon I wonder? In any case, the writing style is far more sophisticated than that of Donna Leon. I'm always impressed when an author uses a word I've not come across before!