A Fatal Grace (Chief Inspector Gamache)

Product Information

No goddamned enlightenment,' she'd said to Saul in her Montreal office the day a batch of rejection letters arrived, ripping them into pieces and dropping them on the floor for the hired help to clean up. Only by talking with everyone will Gamache learn the events that led the murderer to commit this act. I think it’s magnificent on so many levels: as a complex and masterful detective story, as a glorious character study, and as an exploration of universal hopes and fears.

Gamache is a prodigiously complicated and engaging hero, destined to become one of the classic detectives. Sure, nobody liked CC, but who hated her enough—and had the expertise—to pull off something like that? An article in a Montreal style magazine had described him as a 'hot' photographer, and CC always went for the best.Impulsively, Clara gives a package of food she’s just bought to the bag lady, who grasps her wrist and says, “I have always loved your art, Clara. I believe I didn’t meet Louise and her husband, Michael, in person until Malice Domestic in Crystal City, VA, in the spring of 2008.

We also get a bunch of pretentious drivel about art and poetry that is supposed to be profound somehow, but on closer look it is just as half-baked as the rest. There is no shortage of potential suspects and the murder of a homeless woman in Montreal appears to have ties to both CC and Three Pines.The setup for this book is very long and the main thing the author established was how cruel some characters were and how others were affected by cruelty. Although Louise Penny’s novels feature some rather nasty murders, I would classify her Inspector Gamache murder mysteries as cosy crime, especially as there are some lovely descriptions of situation and setting and some wonderful descriptions of food(! Don’t we as human beings naturally associate some homes as either good or bad, depending on who lived (or died) in them? What it comes down to, I guess, is that I'm just one of those people who would much rather spend a night hanging out with Matt and Mick Ballou, drinking a good Irish whiskey at Grogan's Open House than I would sitting around a pleasant fire at the bistro in Three Pines, drinking a nice hot chocolate.

This is a fine mystery in the classic Agatha Christie style, and it is sure to leave mainstream fans wanting more. That conversation comes back to haunt Gamache later in the book, and it almost has an air of magical realism to it. I guess it’s a thread that will perhaps run through the next several books, sort of tying them all together.Three Pines is a fictional village but the description of it makes you wish it, and it's residents, were real. The artist had photographed it and had somehow captured a sense of movement without making it disorienting. They usually have thick cables with orange rubber coating, and the clips are massive, not little bitty alligator clips.

Not her quiet husband, not her spineless lover, not her pathetic daughter—and certainly none of the residents of Three Pines. It’s a perfect setting for the last job Saul intends to do for CC, who wants pictures of herself “frolicking among the natives at Christmas. The reader learns a sliver more about his family life, with a loving wife and an extended family who cannot comprehend his need to work so much. I like the way however the author has brought in elements outwith the particular crime that hint at past and forthcoming events in Gamache and his team's lives.Sayers and Agatha Christie, drew up a list of rules for crime fiction that included the following: “No clue that is important to the solution of the puzzle may be concealed from the reader. All this and much more as Three Pines envelopes Gamache and the reader for another stunning mystery. With a cast of recurring quirky characters who make the town bistro the center of their lives, I have a feeling I will be back in Three Pines for the long haul. I hate the cold, but love reading about places where the snow is metres deep and the water freezes on the end of the firemen's hoses as they try to put out a fire. In doing so, Penny has attracted a legion of enthusiastic readers who, apparently, can hardly wait for each new installment of the series to appear.