17

Ngaio Marsh’s Roderick Alleyn Mysteries

/ rtrube54 / 3 Comments
Image of Ngaio Marsh, from a photograph by Henry Herbert Clifford, circa 1935
Ngaio Marsh by Henry Herbert Clifford ca 1935, crop. Public Domain

New Zealand-born Ngaio Marsh gained renown as one of the four Queens of Crime. She was part of a group of women along with Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie, and Margery Allingham who began writing in the 1930’s, during the Golden Age of detective fiction. Her last work was published in the year of her death, 1982. She is best known for her Inspector Roderick Alleyn mysteries of which she wrote 32. She also loved theatre and directed theatrical productions and this love shows up in some of her books. There is one more work published under her name, with co-author Stella Duffy in 2018, not included in this listing.

I read the Alleyn series over several years, delighted in this gentlemanly detective, and his artist wife, Troy. I intend this both as a resource for Marsh fans as well as an overview of her work. In nearly all cases, I reviewed from the Felony & Mayhem republications of her work, often available at a discount. I’ve listed the publication info for my review with a link to the publisher in the title and a link in the word “review” to my full review. I should note that my reviews include plot summaries but hopefully not spoilers giving away the conclusion Enjoy!

The Reviews

A Man Lay Dead, (Roderick Alleyn 1), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2011 (originally published in 1934). Sir Hubert Handesley hosts one of his famous weekend parties and Nigel Bathgate, a young reporter is invited to join his cousin Charles Rankin for the weekend’s entertainment, the Murder Game, which becomes serious when Rankin turns up the corpse–for real! Review

Enter a Murderer (Roderick Alleyn 2), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2012 (originally published in 1935). Invited to see a play with his sidekick Bathgate, Alleyn actually witnesses the murder he will investigate. Review

The Nursing Home Murder, Ngaio Marsh (Roderick Alleyn 3). New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2011 (originally published in 1935). The Home Secretary collapses of acute appendicitis during a speech on a key bill against radicals and is taken to a private hospital of an old doctor friend for emergency surgery, dying under suspicious circumstances soon after the operation. Review

Death in Ecstasy (Roderick Alleyn 4), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2012 (originally published in 1936). Nigel Bathgate happens upon the strange religious rites at the House of the Sacred Flame just in time to witness the death of Cara Quayne, the Chosen Vessel, when she imbibes a chalice of wine laced with cyanide. Review

Vintage Murder (Roderick Alleyn 5), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2012 (first published in 1937). Alleyn falls in with a theatre company while in New Zealand and discovers that neither murder nor police work take a vacation. Review

Artists in Crime, (Roderick Alleyn 6), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2012 (originally published in 1937). A murder occurs at the studio of artist Agatha Troy, who Alleyn had met on his voyage back to England; the beginning in fits and starts of a romance while Alleyn seeks to solve the crime. Review

Death in a White Tie (Alleyn 7), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2012. At a premiere debutante ball, Lord Robert Gospell’s call to Alleyn about a blackmail conspiracy is interrupted. A few hours later, Gospell turns up at Scotland Yard in the back of a taxi–dead! Review

Overture to Murder (Roderick Alleyn 8), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2012, (Originally published in 1939). A comedic play in a small village to raise funds for the church to buy a new piano turns into a murder mystery when the pianist is shot when playing the opening notes of the prelude by a gun concealed within. Review

Death at the Bar (Roderick Alleyn 9), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2013 (first published in 1940). A holiday at a secluded seaside inn, and a challenge at darts ends up in murder from prussic acid (cyanide). Review

Death of a Peer (Surfeit of Lampreys) Roderick Alleyn 10), Ngaio Marsh. New York, Harper Collins: New York, 2009. A New Zealander’s visit to a happy-go-lucky English family is interrupted by the gruesome murder of Lord Charles’ brother in the elevator serving their flat, making the family prime suspects for Scotland Yard detective Roderick Alleyn. Review

Death and the Dancing Footman (Roderick Alleyn 11), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2012 (originally published in 1941). A staged house-party amid a snowstorm consisting of mutual enemies ends in a death and a suicide that Alleyn must sort out. Review

Colour Scheme (Roderick Alleyn 12), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2013 (first published in 1943). A struggling New Zealand spa by some sulphur springs becomes the scene of espionage, the visit of a famous stage actor, and murder. Review

Died in the Wool (Roderick Alleyn 13), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2014 (originally published in 1945). New Zealand member of Parliament Flossie Rubrick is found dead, concealed in a bale of wool from her farm, and Alleyn, working in counter-espionage during the war, comes to investigate because of secret research on the farm. Review

Final Curtain (Inspector Alleyn 14), Ngaio Marsh. New York, Felony & Mayhem Press, 2014 (originally published in 1947. While Inspector Alleyn is returning from wartime service in New Zealand, Troy Alleyn, his artist wife is commissioned on short notice to paint a portrait of Sir Henry Ancred, a noteworthy stage actor, meeting his dramatic family, encountering some practical jokes including one that infuriates Sir Henry at his birthday dinner, after which he is found dead the next morning. Inspector Alleyn arrives home to investigate a possible murder in which his wife is an interested party. Review

Swing, Brother, Jones (Inspector Alleyn 15), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2012 (originally published in 1949). An eccentric British Lord joins a swing band for a number that involves a gun, and the person at whom he shoots is actually killed with an unusual projectile–a knitting needle–right in front of Alleyn! Review

Night at the Vulcan, (Roderick Alleyn 16), Ngaio Marsh. New York Felony & Mayhem, 2014, originally published in 1951. An actor is found dead in the actor’s dressing room at the end of a play. It seems to be suicide by gas asphyxiation, but Alleyn finds clues pointing to murder by someone in the company. Review

Spinsters in Jeopardy (Inspector Alleyn 17), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2014 (first published in 1953). Alleyn takes his family along to visit a distant cousin in southern France while collaborating with the French in investigating a drug ring. Review

Scales of Justice (Roderick Alleyn 18), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2014 (first published in 1955). An aristocrat in a small village turns up dead by a trout stream with a trout at his side. Review

Death of a Fool (Roderick Alleyn 19), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2014 (originally published in 1957). A fertility dance culminating in a ritual beheading of a fool, followed by his resurrection, ends with the fool having been truly decapitated. Review

Singing in the Shrouds (Roderick Alleyn 20), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2014 (originally published in 1958). Alleyn joins a ship bound for Cape Town seeking a serial murderer, one of nine passengers. Review

False Scent (Roderick Alleyn 21), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2015 (originally published in 1959). The fiftieth birthday celebration of famed stage actress Mary Bellamy is interrupted when she is found dead in her bedroom, poisoned by her own insecticide. Review

Hand in Glove (Roderick Alleyn 22), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2015 (originally published in 1962). An April Fool’s scavenger hunt organized by Lady Bantling ends badly when a body is found under a drainage pipe in a ditch. Review

Dead Water (Roderick Alleyn 23), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2015 (originally published in 1963). A spring on an island celebrated for its healing powers becomes the site of the murder. Review

Killer Dolphin (Inspector Alleyn 24), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2015 (originally published in 1966). Through an accident, a playwright realizes his dream of a renovated Dolphin Theatre, with packed houses for one of his plays, until a murder occurs and a boy actor is badly injured in a botched theft. Review

A Clutch of Constables (Roderick Alleyn 25), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2015 (originally published in 1968). Troy takes a spur-of-the-moment river cruise only to learn that her berth had belonged to a man murdered by an international criminal, who happens to be on the cruise with her! Review

When in Rome (Roderick Alleyn 26), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2015. Alleyn goes undercover on a Roman holiday tour led by a sketchy tour guide suspected of drug smuggling and other corrupt activities and ends up collaborating in a murder investigation. Review

Tied Up in Tinsel (Roderick Alleyn 27), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2015 (Originally published in 1972). Hilary Bill-Talsman is the subject of a Troy portrait and host of a Christmas house party that includes a Druid Pageant, marred when the chief Druid disappears. Alleyn arrives from overseas just in time to solve the mystery. Review

Black as He’s Painted (Roderick Alleyn 28), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2015 (originally published in 1974). The President of Ng’ombwana is coming to England. A man with known enemies, his old school friend Alleyn attempts to persuade him to accept Special Branch protection but fails to prevent a murder at an embassy reception. Review

Last Ditch (Roderick Alleyn 29), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2016 (originally published in 1976). Alleyn and Troy’s son Ricky finds himself in the middle of a murder of a young horsewoman and gets mixed up with a group of drug runners when all he wants to do is get away on a Channel island and write. Review

A Grave Mistake (Roderick Alleyn 30), Ngaio Marsh. New York, Felony & Mayhem Press, 2016 (originally published in 1978). A wealthy widow in a small English village dies of an apparent suicide at an exclusive spa, but clues point to murder with a circle of suspects with motives. Review

Photo Finish (Roderick Alleyn 31), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2016 (originally published in 1980). A New Zealand trip for Alleyn and Troy goes sideways when Isabella Sommita, a soprano and diva is murdered after she debuts a badly written opera composed by her latest love interest. Review

Light Thickens (Roderick Alleyn 32), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2016 (originally published in 1982). Set once again at the Dolphin theatre as Peregrine Jay stages Macbeth, a play surrounded by superstition, a production plagued by macabre practical jokes, and the real murder of the title character discovered just after the play’s climactic scene, with Alleyn in the front row. Review

I discovered in compiling this list that somehow I had skipped one, #18. Oh joy! That means another Alleyn to read. I will add the review when I’ve read it. For others who have read the series, I hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane. I sure did!

Update: After compiling this list, I read Scales of Justice, and have added the review!

The Month in Reviews: January 2023

/ rtrube54 / Leave a comment

Believe it or not, we are already a month into the new year. I hope it has been a good month reading-wise for you, toward whatever, if any, reading goals you have this year. I always want to read books by authors from my own state of Ohio. I had the chance to read two, one of which ended up being my book of the month. The other is a massive best seller, The Deluge, that is a thought-provoking (and scary!) glimpse at the future that may be awaiting us in a warming world. As always, there was good theology including one on the appearances of God, another on Christ as our great high priest, a couple books on theology of work and vocation, a book on five views of the New Testament canon, and a study on hardness of heart from a scholar who I knew from back in the Jesus movement days, Charles “Chuck” Puskas. We even grew up on the same side of town. The biography of Henry Ward Beecher was fascinating–the forerunner of all our megachurch preachers in many ways. I read the sequel to Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge (and have just picked up her latest). Of course it wouldn’t be a month without a Ngaio Marsh–there are TWO here! I met two of my Reading Challenge goals in reading a collection of Wendell Berry poetry and the memoir of Paul Kalanithi, a rising medical neurosurgical resident who receives the worst diagnosis anyone can receive. Actually, reading a classic Oliver Sacks book also fulfilled a goal of reading an author I like. All told, it was a great month of reading with nineteen reviews to show for it. Here they are.

Theophany, Vern S. Poythress. Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 2022 (Originally published by Crossway in 2018). A study of the visible appearances of God to his people in scripture, what they reveal about God, and how they anticipate God’s ultimate appearing in the person of his Son, God incarnate. Review

Crumpled Paper: A Novel About Art and Tea, Michael S. Moore. Sanford, NC: Word-Brokers, LLC, 2022. The tale of the unfolding of an artistic vision, and a friend who, acting as agent, just wants his artist friend to stay solvent. Review

The Intentional Year, Holly Packiam and Glenn Packiam. Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2022. An invitation to stop, assess, and plan around five clusters of practices that enable us to live purposeful lives. Review

Face to Face with God (Essential Studies in Biblical Theology), T. Desmond Alexander. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2022. An exploration of the biblical theme of priesthood and mediation and how Christ fulfills these par excellence. Review

Olive, Again, Elizabeth Strout. New York: Random House, 2020. The sequel to Olive Kitteridge, an older Olive on her second marriage after Henry died, the indignities and transitions of aging, coming to terms with relationships with children and others, and the unique ways Olive shows up, helpfully, when you’d least expect it. Review

Learning Humility, Richard J. Foster. Downers Grove: IVP/Formatio, 2022. A journal of a year-long journey of learning humility including notes from readings, reflections, prayers, organized around the Lakota calendar. Review

The Most Famous Man in America, Debby Applegate. New York: Three Leaves Press, 2007. The Pulitzer prize-winning biography of the most famous preacher in nineteenth century America, and the scandals around his sexual life. Review

God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life, Gene Edward Veith, Jr. Wheaton: Crossway Books, 2002. A theology of vocation, rooted in the thought of Martin Luther, and covering God’s call over all of our lives. Review

Spinsters in Jeopardy (Inspector Alleyn #17), Ngaio Marsh. New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2014 (first published in 1953). Alleyn takes his family along to visit a distant cousin in southern France while collaborating with the French in investigating a drug ring. Review

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Oliver Sacks. New York: Touchstone, 2006 (originally published in 1985). Brief case histories of twenty-four patients with unusual neurological conditions. Review

Five Views on the New Testament Canon, edited by Stanley E. Porter and Benjamin P. Laird. Contributors: Darian P. Lockett, David Nienhuis, Jason David BeDuhn, Ian Boxall, George L. Parsenios. Grand Rapids: Kregel Academic, 2022. Statements from five different theological perspectives on the history, theology, and hermeneutic related to the formation of the New Testament canon, with responses from each to the others. Review

Necessary Christianity, Claude R. Alexander, Jr. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2022. In a culture of options, focuses on the necessities of the Christian life by looking at the “must” statements in the gospel associated with Jesus. Review

This Day: Collected & New Sabbath Poems 1979-2012, Wendell Berry. Berkeley: Counterpoint Press, 2013. A compilation of several volumes of Berry’s sabbath poems. Review

Hardness of Heart in Biblical Literature, Charles B. Puskas. Eugene, Cascade Books, 2022. A study of the words and texts in which they are used referring to hardness of heart holding in tension both the refusal to heed God and the purpose of God in the hardening of hearts. Review

Garden City: Work, Rest, and the Art of Being Human, John Mark Comer. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2015. An argument that our work is an important aspect of what it means for us to be human, setting our work in the context of the arc of God’s work taking humanity from the garden to the new garden city in the new creation. Review

When Breath Becomes Air, Paul Kalanithi. New York: Random House, 2016. The memoir of Paul Kalanithi, a neurosurgery resident who becomes a patient when receiving a diagnosis of state IV metastatic lung cancer, the ways he and his wife respond at various stages, the care he receives, and his reflections on his illness and impending death. Review

The Deluge, Stephen Markley. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2023. A novel imagining the interaction of accelerating impacts of climate change and the unraveling of societies. Review

Cultivating Mentors, Todd C. Ream, Jerry Pattengale, and Christopher J. Devers, eds., foreword by Mark R. Schwehn. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2022. A collection of articles on the theological foundations, goals, and practices of mentoring in Christian higher education with a particular focus on generational dynamics. Review

The Nursing Home Murder, Ngaio Marsh (Roderick Alleyn #3). New York: Felony & Mayhem, 2011 (originally published in 1935). The Home Secretary collapses of acute appendicitis during a speech on a key bill against radicals and is taken to a private hospital of an old doctor friend for emergency surgery, dying under suspicious circumstances soon after the operation.

Best Book of the Month. I’m so glad Michael S. Moore, an Ohio author, reached out to me regarding his book, Crumpled Paper. It’s a delightful tale of drinking tea, enjoying mouthwatering food in quaint cafes, and a community of artists, finely written in plot development, characters and the overall ethos of the book. I commented that this might be my “sleeper” of the year.

Best Quote of the Month: I read This Day: Collected and New Sabbath Poems 1979-2012. I loved this one, 2005, I:

I know that I have life
only insofar as I have love.

I have no love
except it come from Thee.

Help me, please, to carry
this candle against the wind.

I could make this may daily prayer for the rest of my days–just so fitly expressed.

What I’m Reading. Sometimes, reading the Bible in a new translation makes it come alive in special ways. This has been especially true for me as I’ve been reading through the First Nations Version, an Indigenous Peoples translation of the New Testament. I just finished Clarence Jordan’s An Inconvenient Gospel, a collection of shorter writings from this Baptist preacher who started Koinonia Farm and was active in civil rights advocacy as well as translating The Cotton Patch Gospel. I love a good science book and I have been reveling in Siddhartha Mukherjee’s The Song of the Cell. We are “fearfully and wonderfully made” and the cell biology of all living things is truly wondrous as one learns of it. The Back Side of the Cross explores atonement theologies through the eyes of the abused, exploring not only how Christ died for sinners but also the sinned against, who are on “the back side” of the cross. I’ve just begun Pope Benedict XVI’s The Garden of God, a theology of the environment. I’m interested to see how this anticipates Laudato Si. Finally, I’m just getting into a collection of Lenten readings called A Just Passion, from a number of InterVarsity Press authors.

I also recently posted my Winter 2023 Christian Book Preview. There are some great new books out there (and a few that have arrived since!). Needless to say, there is no shortage of good things to read. And if my reviews suggest a few things worth pursuing, then that is a bonus–for you and for me!

The Month in Reviews is my monthly review summary going back to 2014! It’s a great way to browse what I’ve reviewed. The search box on this blog also works well if you are looking for a review of a particular book.

The Reviews: Chief Inspector Armand Gamache Series

/ rtrube54 / 10 Comments
Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

I recently finished Louise Penny’s The Madness of Crowds, the seventeenth in her Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series, and the most recently published. [Updated 12/13/2022: Number 18 in the series, A World of Curiosities has been published and a review for the book has now been added.] For the moment, there are no more Gamache novels to read, unless I go back and re-read the series. This has quite simply been one of the best series I’ve read. While Penny’s books are often favored by women readers, I’ve found myself drawn by the strong male characters, especially Armand and Jean Guy. Particularly, I want to grow up to be like Armand! Equally, I find myself deeply appreciating the strong and diverse female characters–Reine Marie, Clara, Myrna, Isabelle Lacoste, and of course, Ruth (and Rosa!). Like so many readers, I want to live in Three Pines, or foster the kind of Three Pines community where I live (perhaps one of Penny’s hopes). I also have been provoked to thought, and not a little self-examination, by Penny’s insight that a murder often begins many years before with a nursed grievance allowed to fester. Finally, there are Gamache’s four sentences that lead to wisdom:

I don’t know.

I need help.

I’m sorry.

I was wrong.

The older I get, the more I find myself saying these things and I find myself looking back at my younger self and wish I’d learned this wisdom sooner.

I thought it would be fun to create a page with all my Gamache reviews. While I try to avoid spoilers in the reviews, those of subsequent books may give away plot details you’d rather discover for yourself if you haven’t read the previous ones. But if you are like me and want to go back and remember, this might prove helpful. I’ve just included publication info, a brief summary, and a link to the full review.

Still Life (Chief Inspector Gamache #1), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2005.

Summary: The suspicious death of Jane Neal a day after her painting is accepted into an art show brings Gamache and his team to Three Pines, and to the grim conclusion that someone in this small community is a murderer. Review

A Fatal Grace (Chief Inspector Gamache #2), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur, 2006.

Summary: An unliked but aspiring author comes to Three Pines and is murdered in front of a crowd at a curling match yet no one sees how it happened. Review

The Cruelest Month (Chief Inspector Gamache #3), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2007.

Summary: Gamache returns to Three Pines to solve a murder during a seance at the old Hadley House while forces within the Surete’ (and on his team) plot his downfall to avenge the Arnot case. Review

A Rule Against Murder (Chief Inspector Gamache #4), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2008.

Summary: The Gamache’s getaway to a peaceful lodge is interrupted, first by an unloving family reunion, and then by the death of one of the family, crushed under a statue. Meanwhile, the naming of a child forces Gamache to face his own family history. Review

The Brutal Telling (Chief Inspector Gamache #5), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2009.

Summary: The body of an unknown man is found in the bistro of Gabri and Olivier, and Olivier is the chief suspect! Review

Bury Your Dead (Chief Inspector Gamache #6), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2010.

Summary: Gamache and Beauvoir are on leave after an attempt to rescue an agent goes terribly wrong. As each faces their own traumas they get caught up in murder investigations in Quebec City and Three Pines. Review

A Trick of the Light (Chief Inspector Gamache #7), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur, 2012.

Summary: The vernissage for Clara’s art show is a stunning success with glowing reviews only to be spoiled when the body of her estranged childhood friend is found in her flowerbed. Review

The Beautiful Mystery (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #8), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2013.

Summary: While solving a case involving the murder of a prior in a remote monastery, Gamache must confront his arch-nemesis Chief Superintendent Sylvain Françoeur. Review

How the Light Gets In (Chief Inspector Gamache #9), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Press, 2013.

Summary: The murder of the last Ouellet quintuplet, a former client and friend of Myrna’s brings Gamache back to Three Pines which serves as a hidden base of operations as Sylvain Francoeur’s efforts to destroy Gamache comes to a head. Review

The Long Way Home (Chief Inspector Gamache #10), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur, 2015.

Summary: Gamache’s peaceful retirement is interrupted when Peter Morrow fails to return as agreed a year after his separation from Clara and they embark on a search taking them to a desolate corner of Quebec. Review

The Nature of the Beast (Chief Inspector Gamache #11), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2016.

Summary: A young boy from Three Pines, prone to fantastic tales, reports seeing a big gun with a strange symbol, and then is found dead, setting off a search for a murderer, and an effort to thwart a global threat. Review, Second Review

A Great Reckoning (Chief Inspector Gamache #12), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2016.

Summary: Gamache returns to the Sûreté as Commander of its Academy, and finds himself at the center of a murder investigation of one of its corrupt professors. Review

Glass Houses (Chief Inspector Gamache #13), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2017.

Summary: A mysterious figure robed in black, the murder of a woman found in those robes, a confession, and a trial, during which Gamache has made choices of conscience that could cost lives and save many. Review

Kingdom of the Blind (Chief Inspector Gamache #14), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2018.

Summary: Gamache, Myrna, and Benedict, a young building maintenance worker who hopes to be a builder are named as liquidators of the estate of a cleaning woman while Amelia Choquet, caught with drugs, is expelled from the Academy to the streets as a powerful and lethal drug is about to hit. Review

A Better Man (Chief Inspector Gamache #15), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2019.

Summary: Gamache, Beauvoir, and Lacoste are together again, searching for a missing girl amid rising floods and a flood of social media attacks against Gamache and the art of Clara Morrow. Review

All the Devils Are Here (Chief Inspector Gamache #16), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2020.

Summary: A family visit of the Gamaches to children in Paris suddenly becomes an investigation into the attempted murder of Stephen Horowitz, Armand’s godfather, and the murder of a close associate, and will put the Gamaches in great peril. Review

The Madness of Crowds (Chief Inspector Gamache #17), Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Books, 2021.

Summary: A Christmas assignment to provide security for a professor proposing mercy killing leads to a murder investigation in Three Pines. Review

A World of Curiosities, Louise Penny. New York: Minotaur Press, 2022.

Summary: The arrival in Three Pines of a sister and brother involved in a murder case that brought Armand and Jean Guy and the opening of a sealed room and the strange painting found within confront Gamache with two of his greatest fears.

The most recent novel in this series envisions what it is like to emerge from the pandemic. One thing I would say is that this series has been one of the things that got me through the pandemic. My review of the first volume was posted on April 2, 2020, less than a month after the world locked down. The most recent posted June 13, 2022, a bit over two years later. Pandemic has morphed into endemic and the new normal is a scarier world of war in Ukraine, inflation, gun violence, and political discord stretching from Sri Lanka to the United States. Amid all the murders (both in the real world and the books), the Gamache series reminds me of the goodness that remains, a goodness worth fighting and resisting for as well as celebrating in our daily lives. And there is one more goodness, at least…Louise Penny is still writing and book 18, A World of Curiosities, is expected in late 2022. When I get the chance to read it, and any subsequent numbers, it and they will be added to the list!

[Updated 12/13/2022: The review of book 18, A World of Curiosities is now included in this list.]