Chief Inspector Armand Gamache of the Surêté du Québec and his team of investigators are called in to the scene of a suspicious death in a rural village south of Montreal. Jane Neal, a local fixture in the tiny hamlet of Three Pines, just north of the U.S. border, has been found dead in the woods. The locals are certain it’s a tragic hunting accident and nothing more, but Gamache smells something foul in these remote woods, and is soon certain that Jane Neal died at the hands of someone much more sinister than a careless bowhunter. Still Life introduces not only an engaging series hero in Inspector Gamache, who commands his forces—and this series—with integrity and quiet courage, but also a winning and talented new writer of traditional mysteries in the person of Louise Penny.
One of my favorite authors of all time. This is the book that started my love of all things Louise Penny writes. It’s a great mystery, couched in a series that takes place in town where you wish you could live. The people are complex, lovely, although flawed in their loveliness. The primary characters are complex and exactly who you would want trying to solve a crime and bring justice back into your life. While each book is complete within itself, if you are considering reading the entire series, start with this one and read them in…
French Canada in the snow with a hot chocolate If you love a mystery series then dig into Louise Penny’s Detective Gamache books. Best to start with number one and they do progress in the story lines. These are not Le Carre caliber at all. Think “Agatha Raisin”. They are light as a feather and are centered in a delightful town outside Montreal. All of the atmosphere is French Canadian. The descriptions of the food, the town and the characters make me want to move to the fictional Three Pines right now. A murder is the glue that…
and takes a lot of the fun out of the read When the body of an elderly woman is discovered in the woods outside the idyllic hamlet of Three Pines, the first assumption is that this is the result of a tragic hunting accident. Unfortunately, in the world of mystery novels, nothing is ever as cut and dried as it seems.