Susan Kiernan-Lewis Presents Murder in Mont St-Michel: Thrilling French Mystery (The Maggie Newberry Mystery Series Book 19)

 Spotlight  Amazon book description...

Remote. Mysterious. Deadly.
Situated off the Normandy coast, Mont-Saint Michel has been many things in its history: a prison, a siege fortress and an abbey. When Maggie and Laurent—who are struggling with the revelation of a family secret that threatens their marriage—take part in a couples’ counseling weekend on the island they are thrust head first into the setting for a brutal double murder. Because a once-in-a-century storm is bearing down on the island preventing communication with the outside world, their small group of six is trapped on the island—with a murderer. And the clock is ticking. Maggie has only one night to find the killer—and elicit a confession—before the police arrive and go with the obvious evidence—all of which points directly at Laurent. This book is a clean read: no graphic violence, sex or strong language Genre: light culinary cozy mystery, women amateur sleuth. Murder in Mont St-Michel: A riveting mystery thriller set in Provence (A Maggie Newberry Mystery Book 19)

Please refer to earlier discussion for further information... I have chosen to present this as a discussion also. It appears that whoever wrote this book description is inexperienced... While many write multi-genre books, it is rare indeed when you get a clean cozy described as a riveting mystery thriller... at least in my experience... Of course, I admit to my bias against the clean description being used as a basis for evaluating any book...

As soon as I saw the setting on the cover for this book, my immediate genre was identified as a gothic mystery... Once I started reading the conceptual plot was close enough, although very modernized, that I could not escape the emotional impact that the story presents to readers. A well-known Gothic, Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier soon was recalled, given that the setting is in France...in a very old but still used, perhaps haunted, but definitely with hidden escape locations, rooms that elicited fright and danger, including a cellar that, perhaps, had been haunted by the prisoners which were once housed there--during the times that it was not being used as a monastery...

It was on the bottom level of the abbey, just above the main floor, near a chapel called Notre-Dame-Sous-Terre. Maggie shivered again. Literally translated: Notre-Dame-Sous-Terre meant Our Lady of the Underworld. A caption underneath the icon on the map read: This is the oldest part of the monastery. From the first millennium. Maggie felt her scalp prickle. She jammed the map back in her jacket pocket and hurried around a tight corner to the first set of stairs that led downward. How much time did she have left? Were the three minutes up? Surely Soeur Thérèse would be waiting at the statue of the Black Madonna.

A place where you may discover in a hidden area of that building or come face to face with the Black Madonna... How will you view her being there, not as a part of the church itself, but perhaps hidden on purpose... or are you just hallucinating that she is there, where the map has led you...

That is, if you are the main character who is found throughout the book, sneaking through, searching for some way to save her husband from cruel accusations that he is a murderer... Was it an attempt to lighten up the reality of the setting and the events that was to happen to add some family connections in a Bed and Breakfast, which opens and closes the book, even including a recipe thrown in for effect, This was not an amateur detective in a cozy mystery. This was a woman fighting for her marriage. A marriage which she was so afraid of losing that it was she who proposed that she and her husband travel to what was to be a couples retreat...supposedly...

Majestic, magical, mysterious. Maggie stared up at the eighty towering meters of solid granite—topped by the famous abbey and its statue of Saint Michael. She felt her skin tingle at the sight. Mont St-Michel appeared like a floating mirage on the horizon, rising up in a heart-stopping manifestation of what the ancient monks had hoped to create—an abbey as close to heaven as possible. The base of the village loomed before them in a wall of broken rock that supported the lichen-covered eleventh-century Benedictine abbey. Maggie had done her homework on the island. But nothing had prepared her for the sheer enchantment of seeing it like this. Yes, she’d visited years ago. But she must have had blinders on at the time because she felt as if she were seeing it for the first time. “It’s magnificent,” Maggie said breathlessly. As far as hopeful beginnings went, just the sight of this breathtaking fortress was everything she could have dreamed of. Immediately she pushed away her doubts and thoughts of returning to the train station.

Halfway up the Grande Rue Maggie spotted a statue of Joan of Arc poised at the doorway to a small chapel with a plain wooden door. The plaque over the door read Église St-Pierre. The small stone chapel looked modest and diminutive compared with the drama of the abbey towering directly above it.

Maggie had been quietly dealing with almost complete silence for nearly a month, after her 20+ years of being married. Of course, as most women would, she feared he was having an affair, even though it had only been about recently that he had so changed... What else could it be?! While her husband was stoic, he had always been a solid husband and father who was dedicated to her family--a rather strange one, to be sure--still the two had adjusted their lives accordingly when faced with problems before. This time was different... Maggie had no choice. She had never kept silent before so she hoped that group counseling might help. Her husband had not disagreed, so she proceeded to schedule...

On an island, where a small group of villagers surrounded the long-standing building which had come to be a tourist attraction--which was now totally necessary since the present residents were no longer able to financially meet the needs for keeping the facility open...

There were a total of three couples and a counselor who had good references, perhaps, but quickly became questionable given his quick move to establish total control of what was to take place. Phones were gathered, no outside contact was to be permitted. The kitchen staff provided the evening meal and left for the night. Only three permanent residents were left and they did not participate in what was to come...

It had been a beautiful dinner setting, with two women serving them, along with bottles and bottles of wine for consumption... Everybody was beginning to relax, although that was hard for Maggie since her husband had stayed back in their room when she was ready to go and he'd motioned her to go on ahead... He came right as dinner was starting...

“Sometimes I try to imagine what marriage might be like with someone who actually spoke to me,” Maggie said. “I try to imagine how things would be different if I didn’t always have to interpret your grunts or decipher your silences.”

“What is happening?” Maggie said, reaching out for Laurent. But he was far away now. She saw him standing with his hands by his side, his arms long and touching the stone floor. The stone floor that Maggie suddenly realized was wet. She took a step back as she saw the hallway filling up with water. “Maggie, no,” Laurent said, his voice a long way away. “Stay calm.” “The place is flooding!” she shouted. “Don’t you see it?” “It’s not. It’s not there,” Laurent said, his voice a tiny dot a thousand miles away. Maggie was hearing his voice through her brain, through her memory. She looked around the hall and saw the walls begin to move like they were breathing. They inhaled and exhaled, sucking in and out in time with the screams of the prisoners captive in the walls. “Laurent, where are you?” Maggie screamed, looking wildly around for him. But he had gone too. The water was nearly to her knees now and it was clear it was meant to drown her—to drown them all. She turned and sloshed through the deluge, through the filthy water toward the stairwell. A man’s torso floated past, face down, but from the hair and shirt she could see it was Alex. Maggie shrieked and fell against the wall to avoid the corpse, then fell to one knee, sloshing in the water, tasting the salt foam as it splashed up into her face. She scrambled back to her feet and clutched her head to block out the screams of the abbey prisoners, squeezing her eyes shut tight as she did. She heard her name being called as if from a long way away. At first she thought it was Laurent but then it sounded like the prisoners had begun to chant her name. “Maggeeee! Maggeee!” She turned and ran, realizing the water had suddenly gone and there was now nothing impeding her. She felt an abounding joy suffuse her then and when she did, all the lights in the hall blinked on in a golden halo of grace and goodness. She felt encompassed by it. She still ran, with her mouth open in awe at the electrifying show around her, as stardust—literal stardust—sprinkled down from above coating her hair and shoulders. Then the music that had always been there in the background suddenly came to the foreground in an almost mystical crescendo of horns and percussion. Maggie slowed to stare in awe at the golden avenue the passageway had become. It looked as if it was lined in gold, glittering from every stone, every surface. As if goodness itself was imbedded in the walls. The walls pulsed around her in a shower of love and goodwill. She was still moving forward, still in wonderment, as her foot hit something solid and she stumbled. She reached out for the walls to break her fall but they moved away from her. She fell, slamming painfully onto the stone ground, her hands in front of her in an involuntary attempt to catch herself. She lay there feeling the cold of the floor emanating up into her legs, her hips and her hands. Her legs rested on something soft, the impasse that had tripped her. Maggie lay immobile, her body humming with expectation, and saw the last and final dusting of gold dust sprinkle slowly down onto her hands. She felt an incredible sadness come over her. Slowly, she turned to look at the thing she had fallen over. And started to scream.

~~~~~~

It soon becomes clear to readers that the couples were getting drunk. The resident priest had joined them for dinner and one of the wives had been seated next to him...Much to his dislike, she soon was cozying up to him! And during all of this, the counselor was talking, describing what and how the weekend would proceed... At some point, there was a call to have the couples join for the first activity... Individuals were becoming a problem... Soon the couples were no longer matched with their spouses... And the counselor did nothing to solve that strange beginning of a couples weekend... Maggie was very disturbed, when the woman who had been cozying up to the priest set her eyes on Maggie's husband!

Maggie was perhaps the only one who realized that she was experiencing what appeared to be hallucinations... And insofar as possible became alert to her own actions... She believed she had been drugged! The others too?! One thing was clear. Nobody knew what was going on with whom or why... Until a body was discovered in a location that was far away from the area where dinner had been served...

The victim's throat had been cut...

And the last person that she had been seen with...was Maggie's husband.

Who claimed that he had delivered her to her own husband... and pushed her into his arms... The husband had been so drunk the entire time that there was no way for him to agree to that claim...

With such a small number of people involved, I am purposely not including any names except Maggie's who knew she had been drugged and had no way of being able to prove where her husband was, even though she immediately claimed he was with her... Knowing that she, too, had seen her husband with the now dead woman as they had left the dining area...

But when she finally found him, it was clear that there was something wrong with him...he was sweating, woozy... She knew he'd been drugged again... And on her first hunt out into the huge building, she came upon the counselor making a tape (with a phone) of what he had decided to say to the police when they came...that he was blaming Maggie's husband as the last man seen with the dead woman!

And, worse, a major storm front had come and the entire island was soon under water, gaining strength as the rain kept coming down and the tide grew higher, soon coming into the halls in the lower areas... until Maggie, when the female nun had come to talk to her husband, explained that she knew who had killed the woman and wanted to meet him, it was Maggie who went instead, since her husband was now unconscious...

It was Maggie, too, again, who saw a door and heard the tide coming in... closer and closer... Maggie thought she heard a moan, even though she felt she was where she should be...and had seen the Black Madonna... still the nun was not around... 

but the noise of the tide grew louder and she opened the door, seeing how high the water was... And she saw a lump, a small lump already in the water... There was no stopping. she ran to see... if it was the nun...

The woman who had claimed she knew who killed the dead woman... was also... now dead... 

At least Maggie could be sure her husband could not be charged since he'd been drugged... but there was still a murderer there... The island was cut off. There was no way to contact anybody... And the priest pointed out that, in the morning was the first that the police might be able to get there since they normally came to check to see that staff were alright after a major storm...

Along the way just by meeting and observing how the couples interact, readers will meet a very needy, sexual predator, a woman who has found through a life experience that she hates all men and has perhaps murdered a man in her past... Then you will learn that during her being drugged (and didn't refer to it later) that Maggie observed a couple kissing who were not married--yes sexual involvement with another man...Maggie had learned during the early hours of the opening dinner that her husband had cheated on her and had a child by somebody who was now blackmailing him... and, oh yes, it was the counselor who had drugged everybody and had included it in very small print in their contract that he would be using drugs as part of their weekend... and, further that they were "designer" drugs created especially for him and had not...yet...been declared illegal, so they could not sue him, according to his lawyers...

Still, after all these criminal issues that were not "violent," there is, now, two murders to solve and Maggie is getting desperate. She wants to find the killer before the cops even get there so that nobody would be able to accuse her husband, even though he has broken her heart...with what she has learned about a daughter...

She continued to rub her hands up and down her arms. She wasn’t wearing a coat, only a thin pashmina shawl and it was sorely deficient for the job. She turned to peer down the long passageway. Electric sconces lit the way but also illuminated the details of rat droppings and tourist litter in the corners. What are we doing? she thought in mounting despair. This is crazy. Worse, this is useless.

Even now as I work to close this post out, I have mixed feelings about this novel... I try to forget about the book description, but find it still bothers me... The storyline is what you might call TMI... as if all these concepts were stuffed into one book and then just presented trying to explain what it was meant to tell me, the reader... 

The primary first decision, if it was indeed chosen first as the setting, clearly would set a certain tone that called out for a horror or gothic tale... And, in many ways it was, even though neither of these genres is mentioned in the description... Attempting to make it into a cozy, in my opinion, was a complete failure. Mainly because the definition of a cozy is: a subgenre of crime fiction focused on lighthearted, comforting, and escapist storytelling where violence, sex, and profanity happen off-page. I've presented more than I should about the criminal acts that occurred including that the main character was even drugged when she found the first murdered victim. There is maybe 20 pages of lighthearted family drama and that's it...certainly not a comforting book meant to escape into... At the same time, in a weird kind of way it could be a romance, perhaps a suspense romance along with the gothic atmosphere... ???

There was insufficient character development as well for a supposed need for couples counseling, especially when it was turned into a criminal event on the part of the presenter... Readers are left with no early development of what was really going on with the marriages of the main couples... a mystery normally provides clues along the way to allow the reader to become more invested in following the potential villain. However, there was just insufficient information and a time crunch for us to even keep who was husband and wife for two couples... Simply because the tragic main character was running around trying to save her husband--also not a normal task for an amateur detective concept... The very real drama and panic this woman was going through as presented was simply excessive, for want of a better word... for a cozy.

There were also 3 locations in the book where duplicative material was presented, without being corrected. And, of course, creating stumbling blocks to readers as we were forced to reread in an effort to understand what was really being said...

As I had written earlier in a different post, it was perhaps unfortunate that I chose two books to read consequently which both had been declared "clean." I have since learned that Amazon decided to add this as part of their sales pitch. But I have no way to verify whether the writer agreed to this designation. However, whoever considered this has probably never read such a book as this one. And perhaps didn't even read the book being discussed. The murders may not have occurred in the book. That was made irrelevant by the atmosphere that had been created by choosing the site that was used. The location and routine descriptions reeked of tension, danger, and fear... Adding a major storm only added to that affect and couldn't possibly have not prepared readers for possible harm around each corner...

And yet, while reading, it was the setting that kept me reading. It was the mystery, the awareness of the age of the building--that it had once been a prison where prisoners had died... as well as now being a monastery which normally provided a closed off, secretive community that was controlled by religious caretakers who were being assaulted by drunkenness, lies, murder and more...even excessive sexual advancement by one of the wives... Seriously? I just couldn't make it jive into a book that left me satisfied, even with an interesting ending that was totally a surprise...

This discussion will be provided as a personal opinion piece and not submitted to Amazon as a sales support ranking... I will say that learning about this amazing building was fun as a fan of architectural wonders... So I'm suggesting that if you find a similar interest, you spend some time reviewing the many videos available for this now major tourist attraction...

Thought, feedback welcome...

Gabby

Susan Kiernan-Lewis Presents Deadly Faux Pas: A Page-turning mystery set in Paris!

 With its reputation as the most romantic river in the world, the Seine always felt like a surprise to Catherine with its fetid odor and murky olive-green color. She remembered reading that the river flowed into the sea, but as stagnant and listless as it always looked to her, she found it hard to believe that it had enough force. She let Todd lead the way to the table since she knew things like that were important to him. He’d spoken very little on the cab ride over. She would’ve preferred to walk—the weather was hot but it felt good on her skin. Unfortunately, her mother had mentioned it was a nice walk and that was all Todd needed to hear to insist on calling for a taxi.

Here I am sitting

in one of my favorite

places in the whole

world: Aix-en-Provence.

From the author:

The Claire Baskerville Mysteries

I have been wanting to write a mystery centering around a “woman of a certain age” since the day I turned sixty! Claire Baskerville is suddenly widowed and finds herself living in Paris where the dead bodies fall out of the ancient elevator shafts and antiquated wardrobes just enough to keep her and her burgeoning private eye business for the ex-pat community very busy. A tad darker than the other mysteries, this is Paris today and a woman who knows herself and is still open to discovering the world around her. And no, I’m not stopping any time soon. Claire’s adventures have been loosely outlined for another three books past Book 12 AT LEAST. I love this series and don’t see myself stopping writing it any time soon.

Since I'll never be able to visit Paris in my lifetime, I am sure, I wanted to at least set the stage for this book series, which I am going to highly recommend on the basis of this one book... It is clear that the author enjoys writing and sharing, through her travels via her blog as well as through the various series that she writes about...

This particular book caught my attention for many reasons... For instance, the characters include a dominating husband, a kidnapper who becomes enamored with the woman he kidnapped... And then there are two older women who, in this book, are reunited with family from America at the same time, and so become totally involved with the murder mystery that evolves... There is plenty of both turmoil in romantic relationships as well as an extraordinary familial come together when an emergency occurs of people mostly who are friends as opposed to family...

I've purposely chosen the video of a street walk, because the majority of the book will be walking those streets...endlessly trying to find the one kidnapped! But it didn't really start out like that...

You see, the daughter, grandson and son-in-law of our main character, who happens to be a PI working in Paris, has come to visit after many years. One of the problems was the timing, since Covid was touring the world and there was fear, especially by Todd, the son-in-law that they may be forced to stay in France as things are studied... On the other hand, it was clear to those who were at the apartment when they got there, that there was considerable tension within the family. One of the issues that had arisen was that Catherine was interested in adopting Robbie, the son of her mother's husband who had died in an accident. Todd opposed this action. Yet, when they first entered the apartment, their son immediately joined Robbie in playing and all things that boys want to do...

Finally after several attempts to smooth out the events, it was suggested that Todd and Catherine plan a dinner out on their own--which should have worked. Except that, even at the table, Todd kept his eyes close to his phone. And in a sudden explosive act, Catherine grabbed the phone out of his hands and read a short note that was clearly personal to Todd from another woman. Let's face it, if you don't think Todd deserved to be put on the defense, then you, too, may just be a chauvinist! My personal opinion, of course... LOL

In any event, Catherine exploded and a loud argument commenced which was watched by those in the restaurant that evening. Until Todd got up and walked out... And Catherine was left there, not know whether to wait, to leave... And, finally, the decision was made for her...

Only to be murdered that evening... and thrown in the Seine!

And Catherine  then kidnapped by the same man who claimed that her son was in trouble and he had been sent to bring her quickly to him... The truth was that Cameron was quite safe and at home with his grandmother... What she hadn't been told was that Todd had been murdered during the actions leading to the kidnapping of Catherine... And Catherine was torn as to why Todd was not finding her quickly as days went by...

Since the Parisian police thought that Catherine had killed her husband and escaped with the man who was escorting her off the ship, they weren't really interested in changing their opinions and did little to try to find her... It was up to her mother, who at least had come to know the streets of the area around th dock and soon as gathering as much about the people who were on the cruise that night, and what they had done thereafter. Interestingly a man who

My daughter is tenacious. I prayed that stubborn trait was still there inside her somewhere. I prayed that the girl who’d stood on that stage all those years ago, that unlikely award in her hand and that determined expression on her face, was still alive and roaring somewhere in this city.

Claire Baskerville was over 50 and normally able to arrange her professional activities within her own schedule. But now everything was in emergency mode and the only one Claire felt she could really depend upon was herself. She trudged up and down streets showing pictures, talking to anybody who would listen. Once in a while she had help from Jean-Marc a police officer who had worked on her husband's murder case... Genevie, her close friend and neighbor, who had her son and partner visiting from America that week also, had volunteered to help search, while one friend of Claire's from the police fit in support between her own duties... Still, it was right up to the last minute... as Covid controlled times allowed on the streets or when those now kept inside Paris were allowed to begin leaving... Desperation and fear walked beside Claire, while she knew that others were beginning to feel little hope... Could she find her daughter?! Could she bring Cameron's mother home, as he continued to grieve his father?

 

“A son and his mother have a special bond,” she said. “Stop. Please.” “And yet you used this love—the love of a mother for her son—to trick me.” He looked at her and he was stricken. “Don’t apologize to me again,” she said. “Don’t embarrass us both. Don’t humiliate your mother who is looking on you right this—” “Stop it!” he shouted and jumped up. “A boy needs his mother! My husband can’t do it! My husband needs me!” “Not anymore, he doesn’t!” The minute he spoke Catherine felt a ripple of ice-cold fear slice into her. Rashid looked at her from across the table with haunted eyes, his shoulders slumped as if trying to make himself smaller. “What did you mean by that?” she asked. He picked up his plate and retreated to the kitchen. Catherine stood up slowly at her place at the table. “Answer me, Rashid!” she screamed. “What do you know? Where is my husband?” When he didn’t answer, Catherine picked up her plate and flung it toward the kitchen. He ran back to the table and stared at her, his hands going up as if in an attempt to calm her. “Look, it was an accident,” he said desperately.

Except…I felt a wave of hopeless longing and defeat shudder through me. Except, I am desperate. I am a desperate mother who is willing to sacrifice anyone and everyone for the chance—no matter how paltry—to try to recover her child. “Chérie? I am at the hospital now,” Geneviève said. “I will call you when I have news.” She hung up before I could uselessly apologize one more time. I looked at my phone intending to call Adele…and I hesitated. I was calling her to tell her what? To stop? To go home? I couldn’t do that. I needed her. Now more than ever. My phone rang and I saw it was Jean-Marc. I answered. “Did you hear?” I asked him. “Yes, chérie. He is in surgery. Where are you?” “I’m about a block from where I was yesterday,” I said looking around. I thought about telling him about the text message but decided to wait until tonight. What was the point of telling him since I was determined to carry on anyway? “They think the assailant was an ex-boyfriend of Noel’s,” I said. “I overheard the detective saying they were going to put security on Geneviève’s apartment—” “Non,” Jean-Marc said. “They have located the ex-boyfriend.” I felt a flinch of annoyance. Clearly the police can move quickly when they’re motivated. “He was in Cyprus at the time,” Jean-Marc said. “Which means no security for Geneviève,” I said feeling a wave of exhaustion. “Unfortunately, not. Listen, I’ve been thinking,” he said. “Abadi might have tried to replace the car he had to abandon.” “What are you suggesting?” “Nothing really. I’m just thinking out loud.” “You think he might have bought another car? So he’ll be ready to get out of Paris when the lockdown lifts?” That made sense. I felt a flare of energy and hope at the thought. Any new idea helped. Jean-Marc must have picked up on the excitement in my voice. “Claire,” he said in a strained voice, “is there any way you can stop?” “What do you mean stop? How can you even ask me that? The lockdown lifts in just a few hours!” “You must see how the warnings are ramping up, non? This was not a beating this time. Bill may not survive!” “You think I don’t know that?” “Claire, listen to me,” Jean-Marc said. “You cannot find Catherine. It is too late! But you can get yourself killed.” Or Adele. He didn’t say it because he didn’t have to. Clearly even without my telling him about the ominous text message, he had figured out that the attack on Bill was connected to what we were doing. What I was doing. “I have to go, Jean-Marc,” I said. I broke the connection and found Adele’s number and as my eyes filled with tears, I pressed the number. “Are you here?” she asked breathlessly. “I’ve already done a full block.” “Adele, You need to stop and go home.” “Why? Have you found her?” “No, but Noel’s husband has been attacked and I’ve been sent another message. It’s too dangerous.” I heard Adele snort and I loved her for it even while my chest filled with terror at the danger I was putting her in. “I’m not quitting,” she said. “Did you want to meet up and grab a bite or just keep going?” I was so overcome with emotion at her bravery and loyalty to me that at first I couldn’t speak. “Keep going,” I said finally. 

I walked through the next few hours with Jean-Marc’s ominous words of warning reverberating in my skull. You cannot find Catherine. It is too late. That, combined with the new inclination to look over my shoulder every few seconds made me jumpy and on the verge of panic. But I couldn’t help myself. Without Noel and Bill’s help—and I felt ashamed even thinking those words—I had an impossible area to cover. It had been largely impossible even with their help. How does one measure the limits of impossibility? How can you determine the scope of something to be even more impossible than it already was? As I walked the hot sidewalk I felt like I was going through the motions of walking and knocking on doors because the alternative—either sitting with Geneviève and Noel at the hospital or watching cartoons back at my apartment with the children while I waited for the inevitable bad news to find me—was unthinkable. An elderly woman operating a streetside crêperie told me she thought she remembered seeing someone “different” in the neighborhood. I nearly jumped across the counter when she said that. She even described this newcomer as a Middle Eastern man, good-looking, of medium height, but she had no idea which way he went. And he hadn’t actually visited her crêpe stand. She’d simply noted him as he walked by. Telling me he’s here somewhere is not news. I know he’s here. “How did he walk?” I asked. “Did he stroll? Or walk quickly? Purposefully? Did he look tense?” She gave me a look that said she clearly thought I was insane. But it mattered. A man strolling by enjoying the day was not my man. Somebody who looked like he was just out for an espresso and a newspaper wasn’t someone who was holding a woman hostage in a nearby apartment. After that I decided to modify my questions to include affect but it didn’t matter. Nobody except the woman at the crêperie remembered seeing anyone new or different on the street. Amazingly, in spite of the heat and my mushrooming fear of an attack, I didn’t feel the weariness and physical strain that I’d felt yesterday. It was as if my body wasn’t going to recognize anything like blisters or leg cramps as the reason why I didn’t search as far and wide and as long as humanly possible. I resisted looking at my watch because, whenever I did, my brain automatically translated the time into how many hours I had left. …how many hours Catherine had left. My phone buzzed while I was leaning against a stone wall, resting. I was so involved in my desperate mental world of search and probable loss that I jumped in surprise and looked at my phone as if it were a foreign object It was Adele. “Hey,” I said to her. I appreciated that she didn’t ask me if I’d had any luck. Obviously she’d have heard from me if I had. “I’ve finished my streets,” she said. “Do you want to give me Noel and Bill’s?” I’d been mulling that over and decided I had a different job for her that was at least as important. “Jean-Marc thinks Abadi might have acquired another car in anticipation of the lockdown lifting,” I said. There was a pause on the line. “Do you want me to try and find it?” Adele asked. Even on the phone I could hear the misgiving in her voice. “I want you to look at the cars parked on the street where you are,” I said, “and jot down the license plate numbers—unless you see somebody getting out of one who could not possibly be our man.” “Are you sure you don’t want me to knock on doors instead?” she asked doubtfully. I knew it sounded like a long shot. I knew I was asking her to finish her day with literally nothing to show for it. “I’m sure,” I said, knowing that the one thing I was sure of was that I was sure of nothing...

~~~

A Perfect Murder Mystery--because Claire knows who is behind it all...Will it work out that nobody will hurt Catherine?

GABixlerReviews

Kiernan-Lewis, Susan. Deadly Faux Pas: A page-turning mystery set in Paris (The Claire Baskerville Mysteries Book 6) (pp. 237-241). San Marco Press. Kindle Edition.