Sample of literary figures
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Guido Brunetti
Male
Commissario (Detective Superintendent) Brunetti in the Italian state police, stationed in Venice, solves murder cases in a number of books by American author Donna Leon, herself resident in the city. Brunetti is married to Paola, daughter in an aristocratic family and a university lecturer, and has a lively family life which includes children and his own as well as his wife’s relatives. He also battles against the Italian bureaucracy which doesn’t exactly facilitate his work.
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Fredrika Bergman
Female
She was actually going to become a historian like her parents wished, but Fredrika Bergman changed direction and instead became an investigative analyst for the Stockholm C.I.D. She is in her early middle age, has an attractive appearance and a married lover, Spencer, 25 years older than her, and whom she meets every week. In Kristina Ohlsson’s books about her, she usually cooperates with Detective Chief Inspector Alex Recht.
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Gavin Troy
Male
Troy is a detective in the fictive English county of Midsomer, and Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby’s right hand. In Caroline Graham’s novel, Tory is a clever and intelligent police officer, but his prejudices – he is, for example, a homophobe – and rather abrupt manner speak against him. In the TV series <i>Midsomer Murders</i>, his personality has been ‘corrected’ and he is decidedly more sympathetic, and is still a skilled investigator.
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Harriet Vane
Female
At the age of 29, crime writer Harriet Vane stands trial accused of having poisoned her lover. She is shown to be innocent by Lord Peter Wimsey, who falls in love with her and then in some of Dorothy L. Sayers’ novels courts the independent Vane. She participates in his investigations, but is not interested in a more intimate relationship with him. Eventually, however, she gives in, they get married and have three sons.