On a snow-white page at the start of John Berendt's new book the rest of his bibliography is listed. "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil": that's it, and it was published 11½ years ago. Mr. Berendt's smash-hit foray into the gothic secrets of Savannah, Ga., looked like an impossible act to follow - until a spin of the globe led him to Venice, Italy, in search of a similar setting. For all practical purposes he has found one. "The City of Falling Angels" does its best to turn Venice into Savannah on stilts.
No writer looking for murky intrigue will leave Venice disappointed. But, as Mr. Berendt points out, most well-known visions of Venice come from outsiders, even visitors on the order of Thomas Mann and Henry James. He chose instead to infiltrate the place deeply enough to interpret local customs like the catching of pigeons in nets to spirit them out of Venice's public places. He would come to realize that "we're taking them to the veterinarian" was how a discreet Venetian might phrase a pigeon-unfriendly thought.
Mr. Berendt fills his new book with wily figures like the pigeon hunters. But he much prefers the ones trying to bag bigger game. In an interlocking set of stories loosely gathered around the investigation of a spectacular fire, he describes all manner of bizarre patricians and clever parasites, real artists and con artists, annual Carnival participants and those who stay in costume all year round, all united in cherishing Venice's melancholy grandeur. He seeks out the ineffably, aristocratically strange. The man whose palazzo features three space suits and a stuffed monkey is par for the course.
The fire - not nearly as interesting as the true-crime story at the center of "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" - destroyed the famous Fenice Opera House, making it a fitting focal point for a book with its own highly operatic manner.
When Mr. Berendt introduces new characters, they stroll onto the page in full voice, proclaiming their importance with resounding brio. A typical opening gambit here: "Meet Alvise da Mosto, my favorite ancestor. He discovered the Cape Verde Islands in 1456 at the age of 29."
Regardless of whether Venetians really talk this way, Mr. Berendt uses such entrances to fine effect. Though he lacks a narrative of great urgency, he nonetheless delivers an urbane, beautifully fashioned book with much exotic charm. The authorial gondola glides from one sharp-daggered standoff to another, and the details of these stories are chosen with care.
Once again, Mr. Berendt makes erudite, inquisitive, nicely skeptical company as he leads the reader through the shadows of what was heretofore better known as a tourist attraction.
Whatever his personal tactics - and the book is elusive enough to prompt curiosity about them - Mr. Berendt repeatedly charmed his way into the good graces of warring factions. He is able to present irreconcilably different sides of the stories told here without hiding where his ultimate sympathies lie. "The Last Canto," an extended look into the familial and literary legacy of Ezra Pound, investigates the underhanded way in which the poet's mistress, Olga Rudge, was induced to surrender control of his extremely valuable archives. He uncovers a real-life version of "The Aspern Papers," Henry James's tale of a conniving scholar who insinuates his way into a literary family. "We've been living with 'The Aspern Papers' for 40 years,' " Mr. Berendt is told by Pound's daughter.
"I could care less whether Henry James wore a bow tie or a cravat when he wrote 'The Aspern Papers,' " says the man with the stuffed monkey - and with an answering machine message that says, "You have reached the Earth liaison station of the Democratic Republic of the Planet Mars." Like many of the wealthier individuals described, he holds the keys to part of Venice's artistic legacy but finds that even the grandest heritage can be burdensome. In general here, the scale of the real estate matches the stubbornness of the grudge.
Mr. Berendt finds the book's most raging resentments in Count Giovanni Volpi, who as a 9-year-old held sway over a 75-room Venetian landmark, a 300-room Roman palace and 4,000 acres in Libya.
Count Volpi plays a pivotal role in "Beware of Falling Angels," a chapter title that refers to the precarious condition of much Venetian architecture. This chapter is otherwise devoted to the charitable organization called Save Venice and behind-the-scenes social wrangling within its powerful ranks. "Venice will save itself," the count concludes - quite credibly, given the oddball resourcefulness that Mr. Berendt's describes throughout the book. "Go save Paris!"
There is heated competition for the honor of being this book's most vivid eccentric. The man whose collection includes 900 truncheons and 4,000 neckties is certainly a contender. But the most notable - and quotable - is also an inspired business tycoon: the chef who declares "my cuisine is known around the world!" because his specialty is custom-made rat poison, adapted to each country's indigenous garbage. French rats like butter. American rats like vanilla, granola and popcorn. Indian rats enjoy curry.
By the end of the book, this specialist has discovered that Italian rats have begun to prefer plastic to Parmesan cheese, reflecting the growing human appetite for fast food. This man may not be an artist, but he certainly brings a kind of genius to his work. And he perfectly embodies the dauntless, resilient Venice that Mr. Berendt enshrines.
