The City of Falling Angels -- John Berendt

In the prologue of his new book, John Berendt gives the reader a warning.  (Well, actually, it's Count Marcello that gives it, but it was Berendt that used the conversation within the first three pages of his book.  You know what I mean):

"What is true?  What is not true?  The answer is not so simple, because the truth can change.  I can change.  You can change.  That is the Venice effect."

We descended from the bridge into Campo Manin.  Other than having come from the deep shade of Calle della Mandola into the bright sunlight of the open square, I felt unchanged.  My role, whatever it was, remained the same as it had before the bridge.  I did not, of course, admit this to Count Marcello.  But I looked at him to see if he would acknowledge having undergone any change himself.

He breathed deeply as we walked into Campo Manin.  Then, with an air of finality, he said, "Venetians never tell the truth.  We mean precisely the opposite of what we say."

Throughout the book, Berendt returns to that idea--but, depending on who he's speaking to, the idea of 'truth' changes, over and over again.

Alright, here's the short version.  If you liked Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, you'll probably like this one too.

Longer version.  It has basically the same structure--John Berendt goes on vacation, ends up staying, he writes about the city, the people, the history and current events.  The major difference (and who knows--maybe I'm completely crazy about this) is that while Garden felt up-close-and-personal, Falling Angels felt much more distanced.  A lot more of the stories seemed to be second and third-hand, rather than from the original source.  Most of the information about the burning of the Fenice (except for the personal accounts of the spectators, of course) seemed to be culled from newspapers.

That isn't to say that there weren't some completely fascinating people in the book--I was especially taken with the Seguso family:

After all those years of turning the steel pipe hour after hour, Signor Seguso's left hand had molded itself around the pipe until it became permanently cupped, as if the pipe were always in it.  His cupped hand was the proud mark of his craft, and this was why the artist who painted his portrait some years ago had taken particular care to show the curve in his left hand.

And with the Rat Man:

"I'm a chef," he said, speaking to me and the woman sitting between us.  "My cuisine is known around the world!"

"Really!?" the woman said.  "Are you famous for a culinary specialty?"

"Yes," he said.  "Rat poison."

Oddly, both of my examples are actually from Venice.  But as a whole, the book seemed to be focused more on the American and British expatriates that have settled in Venice than on the true Venicians.  (And, woo boy, it totally matters.  There's a family that's been there for five generations, and they still don't count as 'true' Venetians.)

My reading list is much longer now--because of this book, I now have to read The Aspern Papers, some Ezra Pound, and Venetian Stories.   (According to The City of Falling Angels, the author of Venetian Stories was accused of trying to steal (in a sketchy legal way) the papers (and house!) of (the late) Ezra Pound's ailing wife.  Pissing off the majority of Venice with that move, she went one step further and wrote a "fictional" book about Venice--except, of course, the people that she "created" were just thinly veiled descriptions of real people.  Supposedly.  Yowza.)