Tag: Louise Penny

#BookBeginnings Louise Penny’s A Better Man

Yay! I scored a copy of Louise Penny’s newest, A Better Man, from the library for Book Beginnings on Fridays.

book-beginnings-Louise Penny

Book Beginnings is a fun meme hosted by Rose City Reader blog. To participate, share the first sentence or so of a novel you are reading and your thoughts about it. When you are finished, add your URL to the Book Beginnings page linked above. Hope to see you there!

 

A Better Man by Louise Penny

(*Amazon Affiliate link)

Summary:   Chief Inspector Armand Gamache is back at the Sûreté du Québec, but it hasn’t been an easy return. He’s under attack in social media, he’s in a delicate position because he’s been given equal rank to his own son-in-law, plus spring floods threaten. An assignment to look for a young woman who is missing seems like it might be a welcome respite from his problems. Or is it?

First Sentence:

The novel starts with two apparent tweets:

What’s happened to Clara Morrow? She used to be a great artist. #MorrowSucks

Are you kidding me? They let him back in the Sûreté? #SûretéSux

Discussion:

The tweets are part of a theme of this novel. Throughout Louise Penny raises awareness of the impact of unkindness of social networks, perhaps in response to some readers who have posted not so pleasant tweets about herself or her books? Let’s hope the studies that show reading novels increases empathy have some merit.

Penny always has strong settings, but in this one man-vs-nature comes into play in a big way in the form of floods.

What do you think? Would your keep reading?

Author Post: Louise Penny

Louise Penny is a popular mystery novelist. She has a deft hand with plotting, pace, and character development, plus her setting — The village of Three Pines in Canada — shines.

Penny based her main character Inspector Armand Gamache (of the Sûreté du Québec) on her husband, Michael. Unlike detectives in many mysteries , Gamache is a well-rounded family man who is also good at his job.

People ask if the series should be read in order. My recommendation is that if you are going to read them all, then in order is preferable because they do build on one another. On the other hand, I skipped to the most recent one and was still able to enjoy it without reading all that came before.

Inspector Gamache Books in order:

Still Life (2005)

A Fatal Grace (2007)

The Cruelest Month (2008)

A Rule Against Murder (2009)

The Brutal Telling (2009)

Bury Your Dead (2010)

The Hangman (2010)

A Trick of the Light (2011)

The Beautiful Mystery (2012)

How the Light Gets In (2013)

The Long Way Home (2014)

The Nature of the Beast (2015)

A Great Reckoning (2016)

Glass Houses (2017)

Kingdom of the Blind (2018) –reviewed here

A Better Man (2019)

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About Author Posts:

Because I read a lot of mysteries, I’ve been trying to come up with a better system to keep track of which novels I’ve finished. I thought blogging would help, which it does, but I don’t always review everything I read. To get more organized, I’ve decided to create a series of author posts with lists of novels and links to my reviews. I plan to edit these pages as needed.

Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny Review

Time to share thoughts about Louise Penny’s newest novel, Kingdom of the Blind.

Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny

(*Amazon Affiliate link)

Summary: How do you summarize a complex novel like this one? Here’s the gist:

A stranger has named Chief Inspector Armand Gamache to be one of the executors of her will, Still suspended because of an investigation in a case that went wrong months before, Gamache agrees to accept the task as a way to keep occupied. What would seem to be a straightforward duty becomes troublesome, however, when he sees the bizarre terms of the will.

As if that weren’t enough, the case that got him suspended rears its ugly head again and he must track down missing drugs and work to clear his name while at the same time figuring out who murdered one of the heirs.

Read the Acknowledgements For Kingdom of the Blind First

I really wish I had read the acknowledgments before starting the book — they are at the end– because they inform the reading so much. It turns out Louise Penny based her main character Armand Gamache on her husband Michael. In a few sad, wry, warm, stunning paragraphs she reveals how she thought the series was over when her husband passed away. He had been her muse and he was gone.

What happened next is an inspiration to writers. She discovered it is possible to keep writing and even find joy in it. You need to read it in her words, though. Truly a message for the ages.

Throw Out The Rules (Or At Least Loosen Them)

As I mentioned previously, Louise Penny has almost an entire shelf in the mystery section at our local bookstore and her books are very popular. To say she is a successful writer is an understatement. Yet, like another mega-bestselling writer Robert Galbraith (J. K. Rowling), she completely ignores tight/limited third person point of view and blithely “head hops” from character to character, sometimes from paragraph to paragraph. From my understanding, the narrator doesn’t feel far enough away from the characters to be truly omniscient, either, so probably would be called third person multiple?

In any case, it appears that third person limited POV is good for beginning writers who have trouble moving from character to character without confusing readers, but masterful writers can loosen up third person point of view successfully and readers seem to prefer it.

Setting, Characters, and Plot

Another reason it is apparent she is a masterful author is that Louise Penny has a wonderful knack with setting (especially her descriptions of snow), is fantastic at developing realistic characters who drive the story, and she knows how to build a complex and believable plot. Many authors can are good at one or two of those. Kudos to Penny for being able to conquer all three.

winter-kingdom-of-the-blind

Public domain image by Larisa Koshkina from Publicdomainpictures.net

#BookBeginnings Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny

Today I’m reading Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny for Book Beginnings on Fridays.

Book Beginnings is a fun meme hosted by Rose City Reader blog. To participate, share the first sentence or so of a novel you are reading and your thoughts about it. When you are finished, add your URL to the Book Beginnings page linked above. Hope to see you there!

 

book-beginnings-Penny

Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny

(*Amazon Affiliate link)

Summary:  How do you summarize a complex novel like this one? Here’s the gist:

A stranger has named Chief Inspector Armand Gamache to be one of the executors of her will, along with a bookseller named Myrna Landers and a young builder. Still suspended because of an investigation in a case that went wrong months before, Gamache agrees to accept the task as a way to keep occupied. What would seem to be a straightforward duty becomes troublesome, however, when they read the bizarre terms of the will, which before long leads to murder.

As if that weren’t enough, the case that got him suspended rears its ugly head again and he must track down missing drugs and work to clear his name.

First Sentences of Kingdom of the Blind:

Armand Gamache slowed his car to a crawl, then stopped on the snow-covered secondary road.

This was it, he supposed. Pulling in, he drove between the tall pine trees until he reached the clearing.

There he parked the car and sat in the warm vehicle looking out at the cold day. Snow flurries were hitting the windshield and dissolving.

Discussion:

The Chief Inspector Gamache series are set in Canada, around Québec and Montreal. I love the way she describes the snow and the cold.

Although this copy is from the library, I noticed that Louise Penny has almost an entire shelf to herself at our local bookstore. Her books are very popular.

Do you think it is surprising that the title is Kingdom of the Blind rather that The Kingdom of the Blind?

Have you read any of this series? What do you think?

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