“Montalbano sono!” One of my favourite phrases in the Italian language. I am very pleased to have just found out that Inspector Montalbano, a TV series about a Sicilian detective created by the brilliant Andrea Camilleri and played by the incredible Luca Zingaretti, will shortly be returning to UK television for four episodes, with a further six episodes of The Young Montalbano series which began on 7th September 2013.

        Andrea Camilleri is the Italian equivalent of Agatha Christie, and his tales of the crime and scandal often involve the Sicilian Mafia, making the TV shows and books even more compelling viewing.

        Luckily for non-Italian speakers, BBC4 show these episodes with English subtitles and scores of his books have been translated. For those of you who do want to watch it purely in Italian without the distracting subtitles, BBC iPlayer gives you the option to turn them off.

        I’m also excited to watch Inspector de Luca, another Italian detective series that the BBC will be broadcasting this autumn.

        Happy viewing and you’re bound to love Montalbano’s adventures just as much as I do. Funnily enough I’ve never been to Sicily, but I’m making a note of all the places featured so I can visit them eventually. Montalbano’s ‘police station’ (commissariato in Italian) is set in the fictional town of Vigàta and filmed predominantly in Ragusa Ilba (see the photo above), although Montalbano’s stunning villa on the beach is actually located at Donnalucata (the photo below), where you’ll frequently see him swimming in the series. The director has done a wonderful job of showing off some beautiful parts of Sicily and it’s possible to go on an organised tour of many of these sites, although I think I’d rather explore the various sites at my leisure with a hire car.

        While I was studying languages at university, watching Montalbano was my favourite type of revision and whisked me off to Southern Italy while I was actually sitting in England in mid-winter. Enjoy!

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