<p><b>The<br>internationally bestselling author of the Guido Brunetti mysteries tells her<br>own adventurous life story as she enters her eighties</b></p> <p/><p>In a series of vignettes full of affection, irony, and good humor, Donna<br>Leon narrates a remarkable life she feels has rather more happened to her than<br>been planned. </p> <p/><p>Following a childhood in the company of her New Jersey family, with<br>frequent visits to her grandfather's farm and its beloved animals, and summers<br>spent selling homegrown tomatoes by the roadside, Leon got her first taste of<br>the classical music and opera that would enrich her life. She also developed a<br>yen for adventure. In 1976, she made the spontaneous decision to teach English<br>in Iran, before finding herself swept up in the early days of the 1979<br>Revolution. After teaching stints in China and Saudi Arabia, she finally landed<br>in Venice. Leon vividly animates her decades-long love affair with Italy, from<br>her first magical dinner when serving as a chaperone to a friend, to the hunt<br>for the perfect cappuccino, to the warfare tactics of grandmothers doing their<br>grocery shopping at the Rialto Market. </p>Some things remain constant throughout the decades: her adoration of opera, especially Handel's vocal music, and her advocacy for the environment, embodied in her passion for bees--which informs the surprising crux of the Brunetti mystery <i>Earthly Remains</i>. Even as mass tourism takes its toll on the pati