The Patriarch
A Mystery of the French Countryside
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- 85,00 kr
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- 85,00 kr
Publisher Description
Another delightful installment in the delightful, internationally acclaimed series featuring Chief of Police Bruno: Bruno Courrèges is thrilled when he receives an invitation to the lavish birthday celebration of his childhood hero, World War II flying ace Marco “the Patriarch” Desaix. But when the party ends in the death of one of Marco’s longtime friends, Gilbert, it turns into another day on the job for St. Denis's chief of police.
All signs point to a tragic accident, but Bruno isn’t so sure, for there is more to the Desaix family's lives and loyalties than meets the eye. There’s Victor, the Patriarch’s son and Gilbert's sometimes rival, and Victor’s seductive wife, Madeleine, whose roving eye intrigues Bruno even more than her fierce political ambitions. Not to mention the Patriarch himself—did his postwar Soviet ties intersect too closely with Gilbert’s career in Cold War intelligence?
As Bruno’s entanglement with the Desaix family becomes more complicated, his inquiries into Gilbert’s life will become a deadly threat to his own.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Walker's delicious eighth mystery featuring Beno t "Bruno" Courr ges (after The Children Return), the police chief of St. Denis, a tiny commune in the south of France, has cause to doubt his lifelong worship of Col. Jean-Marc Desaix (aka the Patriarch), who was decorated by both de Gaulle and Stalin for his services as a fighter pilot on the Russian front during WWII. When Gilbert Clamartin, a former air attach to Moscow, dies under suspicious circumstances on the estate of Clamartin's revered friend, the Patriarch, it is kept very hush-hush. "Accidental death" is the official line, but Bruno isn't so sure. When little things don't add up, he begins an informal investigation. Before long, decades of Franco-Russian politics raise the stakes, and authorities from Paris get involved. This entry is sure to delight readers who relish a skillful blend of complex international political nuance and pastoral intrigue mixed with a soup on of fine French wine and cuisine.
