Second in the Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series, in which he's back in little Three Pines, Quebec, following the murder of a despicable woman who's recently moved to town for reasons unclear to all.

It is the collection of Three Pines locals who steal the show—as I was told they would by the friend who recommended this series—with their acerbic wit and jabs at one another. I was surprised and delighted to find myself back in the village of Three Pines for the second Gamache mystery.They marched now in warm yellows and blues and greens, for ever perfect and petrified in the Great War. 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.

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. 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. That Quebec cold, and a later snowstorm, are keys to the chill that runs through this otherwise kind of warm, cozy murder mystery filled with (mostly) likable locals. 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. Chapters 1-21: The first lines of A Fatal Grace foretell the death of the nastiest woman in Three Pines: “Had CC de Poitiers known she was going to be murdered she might have bought her husband, Richard, a Christmas gift….

In fact in one way or another, CC has deeply upset many of the inhabitants of the small Canadian village of Three Pines, so when she is murdered during the Boxing Day curling match, no one seems particularly sorry and several people appear to have a very good motive for wishing to see the back of her. Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page. 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.

In Louise’s books I am always stopping to admire wonderful images or jokes or observations (or descriptions of food! I have read the life of Eleanor of Aquitane, and while she was a remarkable woman, she has never rode into any battle, especially not bare-breasted. So it should come as no surprise that when CC is electrocuted in the middle of a frozen lake, in front of the entire village, as she watched the annual curling tournament no one is grieving too much or that her shocking death was no accident.He'd begun to suspect this self-absorbed woman had finally finished absorbing herself, her husband and even that disaster of a daughter and was now busy absorbing him. Meanwhile, in “the snow globe that was Three Pines,” CC’s 14-year-old daughter, Crie, has sewn her own chiffon snowflake costume for her school’s Christmas pageant, “to surprise Mommy.

Also, I enjoyed revisiting some of the villagers from last book: Gabri and Olivier- the heart-warming gay couple, Myrna- the librarian, Ruth - the cranky poet, Clara and Peter - the artists. I am not sure how many times I’ve read A Fatal Grace , but I still find it as extraordinary as I did back in 2006. Heading meaning Three Pines reminds me of the movie Fargo, the people you met but this place Three Pines is so warm and inviting you don't want to leave, or put your book down as you wrap yourself up in the investigation with Chief Inspector Gamache.A Fatal Grace is the 2nd in the Chief Inspe