The Snack Thief

The Snack Thief (1996/2003) Andrea Camilleri translated by Stephen Sartarelli

This is the third Inspector Montalbano book. In the same morning, there is a shooting death aboard a fishing boat and a man found dead in the elevator in his apartment. (This is Sicily, after all.)

Catarella plays a larger part in this book, though only as comic relief, really.

“C’mon, Chief, don’t take it out on me just because it’s windy outside. For my part, early this morning, before contacting Inspector Augello, I had somebody call you.”

“You mean Catarella? If you have Catarella calling me about something important then you must really be a shit head, since you know damn well that nobody can ever understand a fucking thing the guy says.”

And we also see the first instance of Catarella’s problem with doors.

The door flew open with such force that the inspector jumped out of his chair. Catarella appeared, looking very agitated.

“Sorry ’bout that, Chief. Door slipped outta my hand.”

“If you ever come in like that again, I’ll shoot you.”

Yeah, I think that happens in every book from here on out.

There were also bits I loved, because they were so unfamiliar to my American ears.

Montalbano and Valente seemed not even to have heard him, looking as if their minds were elsewhere. But in fact they were paying very close attention, like cats that, keeping their eyes closed as if asleep, are actually counting the stars.

What a strange and wonderful saying.

And of course there is the food.

He stopped in front of the restaurant where he’d gone the last time he was in Mazara. He gobbled up a saute of clams in breadcrumbs, a heaping dish of spaghetti with white clam sauce, a roast turbot with oregano and caramelized lemon, and he topped it all off with a bitter chocolate timbale in orange sauce. When it was all over he stood up, went into the kitchen, and shook the chef’s hand without saying a word, deeply moved.

Have I mentioned that I’ve been cooking Italian recently? No? This is why. Montalbano loves food, and all the dishes sound so god, it makes me wish once again I lived near the sea, and have the money to find small restaurants that made perfect food.

There is, of course, a mystery in all this, and a very good one. But this is my second (or third?) reading, and so I’m reading to spend time with Montalbano and imagine the sites in Vitaga.
Rating: 8.5/10

Published by Penguin

 
 

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