Sign in with Facebook
Loading...
103rd out of 582 books
—
510 voters
Ratking (Aurelio Zen #1)
In this masterpiece of psychological suspense, Italian Police Commissioner Aurelio Zen is dispatched to investigate the kidnapping of Ruggiero Miletti, a powerful Perugian industrialist. But nobody much wants Zen to succeed: not the local authorities, who view him as an interloper, and certainly not Miletti's children, who seem content to let the head of the family languis...more
Paperback, 272 pages
Published
April 29th 1997
by Vintage
(first published 1988)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
1,935)
Commisioner Aurelio Zen, attached to the Rome offfice of the National Police force, is serving in a meaningless position thanks to his involvement in the Aldo Moro kidnapping case. But the kidnapping of the head of a prominent Perugian family takes place, and Zen, merely because of his availability, is sent to Perugia, ostensibly to head up the stalled investigation thanks to his expertise; in reality, he is only window dressing to appease powerful friends of the Maletti family.[return][return]N...more
I like this more because it is set in Italy. The writing style is a little odd at times - it almost feels like a translation, which it can't be because the writer is English - so I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have done if I had liked his style more. However, given I'm now on the third book, this hasn't stopped me and it's a pretty funny look at Italy - all the old stereotypes about backhanders and politics and how you get things done unofficially because that's far more efficient than goi...more
This was an excellent read in Dibdin’s series of Aurelio Zen, detective in Rome but in this novel sent to Perugia, to help settle the case of a billionaire kidnapped, ransom paid, but not returned. The author is brilliant at setting the stage for the arcane workings of Italian government, where nothing is as it appears, and good things happen back handedly. The book finally gives Zen’s backstory of why he was demoted to housekeeping, after he almost found out where former Prime Minister Moro was...more
This is the first in the series of novels featuring Aurelio Zen, a detective from Venice who, in the course of his career, investigates crimes in many parts of Italy. Here, although he is living in Rome at the time, he is sent to Perugia to investigate the kidnapping of a rich business man, Ruggiero Miletti.
The main focus of the plot appears to be fierce internal rivalries within the Miletti family, several of whom leave almost everything to be desired. Despite many obstacles, Zen eventually fig...more
The main focus of the plot appears to be fierce internal rivalries within the Miletti family, several of whom leave almost everything to be desired. Despite many obstacles, Zen eventually fig...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
Kidnapping as culture in Italy. Power and corruption of the institution in Italy. What is a ratking? "Is it the rat king--the dominant member of a pack? No. "A ratking is something that happens when many rats have to live in too small a space under too much pressure. Their tails become entwined and the more they strain and stretch to free themselves the tighter grows the knot binding them, until at last it becomes a solid mass of embedded tissue. And the creature thus formed, as many as thirty r...more
The book started out being interesting. Rich head of family kidnapped before the start of the book. Old family friend calls up his high level contacts with the government to get them to send a high ranking Roman police officer to take over the case. It has been many months since the old man was kidnapped without progress.
The man character, Aurelio Zen, started off seeming to be a likeable guy. He was always drifting away in the book. Mind miles away from the case or what was going on around him....more
The man character, Aurelio Zen, started off seeming to be a likeable guy. He was always drifting away in the book. Mind miles away from the case or what was going on around him....more
After enjoying the recent PBS series about Aurelio Zen I decided to see what the original was like. As it turned out, the plot of the first TV show was only slightly related to the plot of the novel. "Inspired by" would almost be an exaggeration. Even Zen himself was quite different--the only thing that seemed consistent between the series and the first book was the tone, the paranoid sense of multiple levels of interest, both in the police and in the suspects, the feeling that everything in Ita...more
I've been meaning to get into the Aurelio Zen series for a while now. Just somehow Dibdin never got to the top of the 'to read' pile. It got a meteoric rise to the top when the BBC screened adaptations of the books. I had to get to know Zen myself before I saw someone else's interpretation of him.
Zen's a Venetian living and working in Rome, sent to work on a case in Perugia. He's pretty typical of fictional detectives. There's nothing super original in the character so far. The interesting part...more
Zen's a Venetian living and working in Rome, sent to work on a case in Perugia. He's pretty typical of fictional detectives. There's nothing super original in the character so far. The interesting part...more
This is the second Dibdin novel about detective Aurelio Zen that I have read. I think this series is OK, but prefer Donna Leon and Andrea Camilleri, whose writing is sharper.
The best thing about Zen is that he is a fresh break with so many anglo-saxon detectives with their broken marriages, drink problems and demons. While he is separated from his wife, he lives with his mother and functions as a man.
The problems he faces are very Italian, in that he is surrounded by corruption and nepotism. He...more
The best thing about Zen is that he is a fresh break with so many anglo-saxon detectives with their broken marriages, drink problems and demons. While he is separated from his wife, he lives with his mother and functions as a man.
The problems he faces are very Italian, in that he is surrounded by corruption and nepotism. He...more
Ratking follows Dottore Aurelio Zen as he is literally pushed into the detective world once more after being a paper-pusher with the police for four years. He was shamed after a case went bad and put on desk duty indefinitely. He's put in a no win position as an officer as he tries to bring Riggerio Milleti back home. Milleti has been kidnapped and held for ransom for months while his crazy family bickers and fights over every penny that goes into the ransom money.
The book follows the inner work...more
The book follows the inner work...more
In writing about this I may well be writing a review of the TV show. I don't normally read mysteries like this, but did so after Boyd Tonkin wrote that there was so much more in the books... so many more characters and characterisations from all walks of Italian life.
So I enjoyed the TV show okay - although I had a few big problems with it. One was that all the men were played by Englishmen and all the women seemed to be Italians. The same company made the excellent Wallander series with Branagh...more
So I enjoyed the TV show okay - although I had a few big problems with it. One was that all the men were played by Englishmen and all the women seemed to be Italians. The same company made the excellent Wallander series with Branagh...more
I really enjoyed the BBC TV series (cancelled after three episodes, doggone it). Then I saw this book at a library sale and thought I'd try it. The basic plot: Venetian detective Aurelio Zen, who is in the doghouse with his Roman employers, is sent to Perugia to investigate the kidnapping of a wealthy, well-connected businessman. It's a no-win situation for the police, of course, which is why Zen is put in charge of the case.
Michael Dibdin does a great job portraying the complex relationships wi...more
Michael Dibdin does a great job portraying the complex relationships wi...more
My first encounter with Golden Dagger Award winning author Michael Dibdin's Aurelio Zen Series was watching PBS Masterpiece Mystery! one Sunday night. The onscreen Aurelio is somewhat younger and darker than the one in RATKING. Here we are introduced to this anti-hero and taste the late Dibdin’s irony and black humour in Zen’s persona that the telecast so aptly captures. As with new introductions, the reader isn’t sure of Zen. His opening scene shows us an indifferent policeman. Aurelio sits by...more
3 likes · like · see review
This is the first in the (Zen) series. I have read one other (can't remember which), and have never seen the TV version. By now this is quite old (published late 80s and set in the early 80s), so the back story involving Zen's connection to the Aldo Moro case is comparatively recent to the events in the book. It took me back to the period - quite a frightening amount of kidnapping seemed to be going on in Italy in the 70s. When I worked in a branch library in the 90s, readers of Michael Dibdin s...more
Aug 08, 2011
Monica
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
crime-and-or-evil,
italian
I was inspired to reread this after watching the television series, which was a lovely travelogue and pretty good TV, but bears only a superficial resemblance to Michael Dibdin's complex stories.
At the start of Ratking, Zen has been stuck in a dead end administrative job for a decade as punishment for getting too near to the truth in his investigation of the Aldo Moro kidnapping. He is sent off to Perugia to participate in the investigation of the kidnapping of a local industrialist. He is expe...more
At the start of Ratking, Zen has been stuck in a dead end administrative job for a decade as punishment for getting too near to the truth in his investigation of the Aldo Moro kidnapping. He is sent off to Perugia to participate in the investigation of the kidnapping of a local industrialist. He is expe...more
Heading to Italy this summer inspired me to read some books set in that gorgeous country and the Aurelio Zen novels quickly came to mind. The PBS series (hopefully will return with more episodes) was very well done, and now I can say that the novels are great reads, too. The insane hierarchy of the Italian police and political system is the featured setting and Dibdin portrays it masterfully. Aurelio's skill is finding out how to "get the bad guys" while preserving his job, no easy task since mo...more
This is probably my favorite of the Aurelio Zen books I've read. It's the first, too, which isn't surprising. Zen is a detective in Italy where the guilty go largely unpunished and skill and ability count for nothing. That probably accounts for why he's so neurotic. Anyhow, this one deals with a kidnapping in Perugia of the patriarch of a wealthy and powerful family. Everyone has secrets, natch, and justice isn't done.
Well-written. Interesting main character. Overall sleaziness. Generally grim....more
Well-written. Interesting main character. Overall sleaziness. Generally grim....more
First in the Aurelio Zen Italian policeman mystery series. A victim of Italian police intrigues several years earlier, Zen has been assigned to non investigative duties. He is brought back to investigate the kidnapping of a wealthy industrialist because he happened to be the only one available and temporarily assigned to Perugia from Rome to handle the case. The case is full of police and political intrigues complicated by intrigues within the family. Zen has to work his way through these mazes...more
This happens to be the Inspector Aurelio Zen mystery set in Rome, but all of them take readers to different parts of Italy, with different fascinating local pecadillos. Dibdin's Inspector Zen is one of my favorite fictional characters of all time, pursuing justice by using the corrupt system against itself, while never losing his sense of the absurd. Love the look inside Italian politics, love the twisty plots, love the details of Italian life he brings to the table. Recommend the entire series,...more
A police commissioner, Aurelio Zen is assigned to a kidnapping case in Perugia, Italian from the Rome office. His reputation is not the best due to a prior kidnapping of an ex-prime minister of Italy, Aldo Moro who was killed by his kidnappers and Zen was part of the police force assigned to that case. Ruggiero Miletti, the head of a rich and powerful family has been held for months, one ransom paid but he was not released. Zen is left mostly on his own to solve the case and runs into trouble wi...more
I loved the central metaphor of the 'ratking' at the heart of this very good crime novel. Seems especially apt to finish the story on the very eve of Berlusconi's resignation at Italian PM, too. Although the plot and action takes place well before Berlusconi's ascent to power, the murky overlap of corporate, police, judicial and political corruption described by Dibdin shows how a man so steeped in corruption, as Berlusconi, could not only succeed in Italian politics, but also thrive and remain...more
I wasn't sure I was going to like Aurelio Zen (the police commissioner/detective) when I began reading this book. He seemed a bit of a doormat at first, but he improved, showing subtle intelligence as he made his way through the precarious Italian police/judicial system. I was very fond of Zen by the time I finished the book and will definitely read more Zen stories. The descriptions of the Italian countryside and way of life (especially the "insolent stares" of Italians, ha) were right on targe...more
Set just north of Rome in the town of Perugia, this is a typical story of local power-through-wealth and corruption, which panders to the money. Still, the characters are interesting, and the descriptions of the landscape, Perugia's scenery, and a brief look at a few areas in Rome are extremely well done. The use of British slang & vulgar language, however, was very inappropriate and strange. Every country curses a little differently. After living in Italy for several years, I was expecting...more
3.5 stars. Interesting read, the style and voice of the book took some getting used to - I imagine it reads like Italian would sound, full of exclamations. The corruption in all levels of Italian government, police, and bureaucracy in the late 1970s was fascinating, and the character of Zen was interesting. It was hard to get into at first, and the mystery itself really plays second fiddle to the physical and political landscape of the story, but I may have to read more. The references to cuttin...more
This book had me at turns bored, bewildered and intrigued until the last 50 pages grabbed my attention and took me on a whirlwind finishing sprint. I'm not sure if I can recommend it but equally can't say don't try it - you may love it. The setting makes a change and the author weaves a well constructed path between straightforward Italian stereotypes and modern, real, living, breathing people surviving in a country riddled with the echoes of its past. On the whole I'd say: if you can find it ch...more
Grabbed this book after enjoying the Masterpiece Mystery series that aired recently on PBS. I first had to get over the fact that Aurelio Zen in the book is not Rufus Sewell of the TV series, he is in fact more of a derelict 50ish loner who lives with his elderly dependent mother and is not at all involved with his beautiful secretary, I was easily taken up with the grittier and more graphic depictions of crime and justice that would have never made it to the small screen. Looking forward to fin...more
Mar 14, 2013
Kia
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
mystery readers; police procedural readers
Recommended to Kia by:
NPR/PBS
Like many of the reviews on this book, I turned to this book mostly after learning there was a Masterpiece Mystery series (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/zen/) coming out based on these books. And like many of the others, I find myself comparing Rufus Seawell's Zen with the character Dibdin created. That's almost always a mistake.
I can't say that I don't like Dibdin's Zen, I think I prefer the version written for Masterpiece. Dibdin's Zen is a restless man in his 50s struggling with the fa...more
I can't say that I don't like Dibdin's Zen, I think I prefer the version written for Masterpiece. Dibdin's Zen is a restless man in his 50s struggling with the fa...more
I got this book because I really liked the show. And as it was cancelled way to early, I was hoping to get even more from the books.
I don't often say this, but the book was not better.
It's obviously unfair blaming a book because it wasn't like a TV show it has inspired, but I was just so disappointed. Gone was the fun, the witty, smart and sexy detective, the charming Italian stuff. Instead we got dark, moody, corrupt and gritty. Zen is in his 50s in the book, unsure of himself, disillusioned, a...more
I don't often say this, but the book was not better.
It's obviously unfair blaming a book because it wasn't like a TV show it has inspired, but I was just so disappointed. Gone was the fun, the witty, smart and sexy detective, the charming Italian stuff. Instead we got dark, moody, corrupt and gritty. Zen is in his 50s in the book, unsure of himself, disillusioned, a...more
I bought this book when I learned that PBS is featuring a Masteroiece Mystery series of Didbin's mystery novels featuring the police commissioner, Aurelio Zen. And Rufus Sewell is playing the lead character! This is the first book in that series, so I will read it with Sewell cast in the lead.
The novel has ten times as many plot elements as the tv version, though that is no surprise. More characters, too. The show seems to have continued plot lines from the earlier two episodes into Ratking, th...more
The novel has ten times as many plot elements as the tv version, though that is no surprise. More characters, too. The show seems to have continued plot lines from the earlier two episodes into Ratking, th...more
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
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 Ratki...more
More about Michael Dibdin...
Share This Book
3 trivia questions
More quizzes & trivia...
“Criminals have the same aspirations as everyone else. That's why they become criminals.”
—
2 people liked it
“Imagine living in a country where the cops are all people who're cut out for the job.”
—
1 person liked it
More quotes…
Oct 09, 2011 05:28am