The Voice of the Violin

It is one of those black days that afflict Montalbano, who is abetted when the weather is bad and becomes intractable. The day is actually already set to be a bad one because the inspector will have to go to the funeral of the Commissioner's wife. Montalbano is also worried about the fact that he'll be accompanied to the funeral by the agent Gallo, an insanely crazy driver.

Soon the bad omens come true: on the way to a country road at insane speed, at least according to the inspector who loves walking at a crawl, Gallo invests what seems to be a suicidal chicken, making the car skid and hit another car parked in front of a villa. The inspector, cursing, decides to put himself personally to the guide after having left a note under the windshield wiper of the damaged car to warn the owner. Since Gallo complains about the blow he has received, Montalbano deviates for the hospital where the two spend the entire morning between exams and counter-examinations. On the way back - it has now become too late for the funeral ceremony - the inspector notices that the damaged car has remained where he left it with the ticket still in the windshield wiper.

Montalbano finds the matter quite strange and broods the fact over the whole day until, after concluding the bad day with a stormy phone call with his girlfriend Livia, unable to fall asleep, he gets up in the middle of the night and ventures to find out what's inside the villa.

Finding the damaged car still where it was in the morning, with burglar art it forces the door of the villa which has signs of being inhabited but appears deserted. He wanders through the various rooms until in a bedroom a gruesome scene appears in the eyes of the inspector: a young woman, blonde and beautiful, completely naked, lays dead in her bed.

• Salvo Montalbano, Vigàta's chief police station
• Domenico "Mimì" Augello, Montalbano's deputy and close friend
• Giuseppe Fazio, Montalbano's right-hand man
• Agatino Catarella, police officer
• Livia Burlando, Montalbano's eternal girlfriend
• Dr. Pasquano, Vigàta's local forensic pathologist
• Michela Licalzi, the dead woman
• Commissioner Luca Bonetti-Alderighi, Montalbano's new superior
• Maurizio Di Blasi, Michela's young secret lover
• Anna, Michela's attractive friend

Maxine Clark described the novel as "a perfect example of all that is good about this series. The plot is one of the stronger, leaner ones".[1]

It was first adapted for television by RAI with Luca Zingaretti in the TV series Inspector Montalbano. The episode was the second of the series and aired on 13 May 1999.[2]