strong French police procedural thriller

books:


	• Have Mercy on Us All: A Novel (Chief Inspector Adamsberg Mysteries) Fred Vargas Simon & Schuster, 2005 - 368 pages average customer review:based on 5 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

3 to 4

A rumpled chief inspector who forgets people's names, relying on intuition, logic and luck to solve cases, a character that almost stretches believability too much. The first few chapters are not smooth, this book was written in French and translated into British. But once people start dying it moves right along, with an unconventional if not brilliant ending, a good read but not fantastic. Not as good as an Ian Rankin Inspector Rebus novel. It was entertaining to read but it did not leave me looking for more books by the same French author, a woman named Fred.

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Very interesting historical mystery

Both my wife and I really enjoyed this book. Very interesting characters and a bit of a history lesson thrown in we highly recommend it for a change of pace.

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strong French police procedural thriller

Over fourteen years ago, Joss Le Guern complained to the ship owner that the vessel he captained Nor'easter was unsafe. He was told he is to do his job or someone else will. The ship breaks apart; an angry Joss survives and breaks the leg of the owner. Joss is convicted of assault and battery and attempted murder; he spends nine months in prison and his sailing career is over.

After spending the next seven years as a drunk, Joss becomes a Parisian town crier. For the past seven years, three times a day he collects messages from his box and calls out the news. However, the message he finds this time claims the Black Death is coming. He takes the note to Chief Inspector Adamsberg, who assumes a hoax is being played on the crier; that opinion changes when he and his subordinate Danglard notice "hex" signs used during the Middle Ages to ward off the disease appearing on doors and a corpse that displays the symptoms of the Plague. Adamsberg takes the threats seriously hoping to stop the Black Death from devastating Paris.

HAVE MERCY ON US is a strong translation of a French police procedural thriller. Once Adamsberg realizes the biological terror is potentially real, the pace never slows down. Joss is a terrific character struggling as all whistleblowers seem to dio when they act courageously and challenge authority for behaving illegal or amoral, but in his case guilt leaves him a shadow of himself until now. Adamsberg and Danglard are terrific cops confronting a lethal unknown enemy with no time to spare. Fred Vargas writes a strong thriller that translates quite nicely into a one-sitting adrenalin read.

Harriet Klausner

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Great and complex mystery

Although I read this mystery in a German translation I just love the style Fred Vargas writes in, and want to highly recommend it. The mystery is complex and spell binding, and the characters are convincingly realistic. All the irrationalities and contradictions of the different personalities are presented in a fascinating but not boring detail.
I also just finished reading another Fred Vargas novel 'Sous les vents de Neptune', and I am looking for more, to find out, how the American translation is done. However, it seems that not all of her mysteries are translated into English, which is unfortunate

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In a small Parisian square, the ancient tradition of the town crier continues into modern times. The self-appointed crier, Joss Le Guern, reads out the daily news, snippets of gossip, and lately, ominous messages -- placed in his handmade wooden message box by an anonymous source -- that warn of an imminent onset of the bubonic plague.

Concerned, Le Guern brings the puzzling notes to the bumbling but brilliant Chief Inspector Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg and his straight-edged, right-hand man, Adrien Danglard. When strange signs that were historically believed to ward off the black death start to appear on the doors of several buildings, Adamsberg takes notice and suspects a connection with Le Guern's warnings. After a flea-bitten corpse with plague-like symptoms is found in one of the marked buildings, Fred Vargas's inimitable genius chief inspector is under pressure to solve the mystery and restore calm to a panicked Paris. But is it a real case of the bubonic scourge, or just a sinister trick designed to frighten as the body count grows and the culprit continues to elude the police?

Peopled with charming and eccentric Gallic characters, and packed with gripping historical detail, Have Mercy on Us All is a complex, surprising, and stylish tale from France's finest mystery writer.

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recommendations

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