A Guarneri violin is a center object in one of Andrea Camilleri’s main Montalbano novels “La Voce del violino” (The voice of the violin). In the summer of 2010, the ex-Vieuxtemps Guarneri del Gesù, a violin built in 1741 by Bartolomeo Guisseppe Guarneri was offered for sale at auction with a starting bid of $18 million, the highest price ever sought for a musical instrument. The violin was later sold for an undisclosed sum and Anne Akiko Meyers was given lifetime use.