A Private Venus

A Private Venus (Italian: Venere privata) is a 1966 detective novel by the Italian writer Giorgio Scerbanenco. It tells the story of how the former doctor Duca Lamberti is assigned to treat the alcoholic son of a millionaire, and begins to unveil the secrets surrounding the death of a young woman in the affluent world of Milan. It was the first in a series of four novels about Dr. Duca Lamberti. An English translation by Howard Curtis was published in 2012.^[1]

The book was the basis for the 1970 film Safety Catch directed by Yves Boisset.^[2]

Reception

Kirkus Reviews wrote in 2014 that "the first volume in Scerbanenco’s Milano Quartet is a blast from the past, a sleek, stripped-down reminder of the fast, brutal days of Continental noir".^[3]