A Fatal Grace (Chief Inspector Gamache)

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I started working with Louise in October 2006, after the editor who had bought her first three books left Minotaur for another company. He'd take deep dark breaths of the night air, trying to reassure himself that the stifled yawn of his dinner companion was because of the wine or the magret de canard or the warmth in the Montreal restaurant, wrapped as they were in their sensible winter sweaters. As a bitter wind blows into the village, something even more chilling is coming for Gamache himself. Each morning he'd wake early and go into the young day, when the world was new and anything was possible, and he'd see how lovely Montreal was. I’m wondering if you mean that Yvette has somehow become the repository for the fears of her family.

CC lived, Saul knew, in her own world, where she was perfect, where she could hide her feelings and hide her failings. As Gamache and the others notice the raw distaste that others had for CC, they cannot help but wonder why much of CC’s life cannot be substantiated. I also marvel that someone like me, who is at least as much of a skeptic as Jean-Guy Beauvoir, can find myself wondering about such mysteries as lemon meringue pie. This patchwork quilt of personalities keeps the story from getting too dreary, though Penny does offer much in the way of backstory and character development, such that I am going to have to keep things straight to learn all their nuances.He watches, he listens, and like me, he seems to suspect various possible perpetrators of the murder. Something bigger than just the murder at hand seems to be brewing on the horizon - something with a sinister vibe that does not bode well for Gamache. Even the revelation that she's intelligent, cunning, and desperate enough to have arranged her mother's ingenious murder is shown hand-in-hand with a portrayal of her in a catatonic fantasy not altogether different from CC's own narcissistic delusions.

I was surprised and delighted to find myself back in the village of Three Pines for the second Gamache mystery. She turned now and actually looked out their hotel room window at the building opposite, as though surveying her 'people'.Within minutes Gamache and his second-in-command, Inspector Jean-Guy Beauvoir, are on their way to Three Pines, to investigate the very odd death of CC de Poitiers. By that time, Still Life had won many awards (including the Anthony, Arthur Ellis, Barry, Dilys, and New Blood Dagger) for Best First Novel, but not the Agatha; and we didn’t want to jinx anything by expecting her to win Best Novel for A Fatal Grace. She has won numerous awards, including a CWA Dagger and the Agatha Award (five times) and was a finalist for the Edgar Award for Best Novel. They talk about moments from their past when something inexplicable caused them to behave in a certain way.

Having learned that CC de Poitiers, who claimed to be the daughter of Eleanor and Henri de Poitiers, invented both her name and her past (Eleanor de Poitiers, better known as Eleanor of Aquitaine, actually died in 1204), Gamache needs to find out who CC really was.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. There, in the Canadian winter, you have to pile on the layers to try to retain what body heat there is, becoming barely acceptable in another ‘fashion’. When Saul turns up at the Bistro on Christmas, Myrna invites him to the community breakfast and curling match on the following day. It is easy to show you belong if there is someone else to collectively exclude, lots of bullying works this way. The difficulty was the sheer nastinesss of C C de Poitiers - she had absolutely no redeeming feature.

It wasn't all that long ago, before he'd taken the contract to freelance as CC's photographer and lover, that he'd actually thought the world a beautiful place. So if you love mystery and rare, rich setting; if you long for unique characters and meaning deep as bones, then don't miss A FATAL GRACE.Might she have been hiding something bigger, something even more disgusting than the tidbits she puts on display? What are the clues to the murders in A Fatal Grace, and how does Louise Penny hide them in plain sight? She plans to make that place hers, and in her mind, she plans to raze all that makes the place amazing.