God's Dog

God's Dog is Diego Marani's first detective novel, introducing Domingo Salazar, a Dominican monk, who is a Vatican secret agent. Italy is now a theocratic state ruled by the Vatican, whose secret agents are dedicated to root out non-believers and heretics. The sanctity of life is being challenged by a cell of dissidents helping sufferers commit euthanasia. 'The crime genre is thronging with honest, likeable cops working within corrupt regimes but the writers of such novels give themselves a get-out-of-jail-free card by allowing us to sympathise with their conflicted protagonists, chafing against their brutal paymasters. Marani (in Judith Landry's able translation), however, is more audacious, granting his anti-hero a terrifying religious fervour, unquestioning of the status quo. What's more, he is an intelligent, intuitive investigator, skilled at using psychology against his victims. Which is what makes the success of this energetic and trenchant novel all the more impressive, however reptilian its protagonist. Marani's church authorities here propose an interfaith movement called "Bible-Koranism" designed to stamp out secularism; as Salazar calmly explains this historical necessity to non-believers, the reader may hear Marani's warning voice: be aware ' Barry Forshaw in The Independent 'Here, though the terse economy of detective prose works to move events briskly to their violent conclusion. In this Marani is very well served again by Judith Landry's excellent English translation, which captures both the novel's nod to generic conventions of style, and its stranger little flourishes and apercus.' Bharat Tandon in The Times Literary Supplement