A review by ericgaryanderson
Salaseura by Michael Dibdin

4.0

Michael Dibdin writes compact, tightly-plotted mysteries set in and around the mean streets, sleazy docks, and upscale environs of urban Italy. CABAL's a Rome and Vatican novel, which opens with a rousing, fall-from-the-top-of-St-Peter's death and zips onward from there. Like the other Dibdin novel I read this summer, CABAL clocks in at just about 250 pages: Dibdin is really good at compressing 350-page plots into 250 pages without making the narrative feel or seem any less densely textured. This means that he happily violates some of the expectations of the genre: key moments in the mystery plot can blow right by without much fanfare or explanation, and some of the characters remain enigmatic cameos. That's a good thing, so far as I'm concerned, but at least with this book, the pacing of the ending felt a bit off to me. It sort of slows down and then speeds up in ways that don't quite work. Still, a good read, and a much, much better Vatican novel than anything by Dan Brown!