A Trick of the Light
An Armand Gamache Mystery by Louise Penny
Review: Louise Penny has truly written a "who done it" that surprised me all the way to the end. Starting with a murderer that was wrongly found guilty and then going into a murder that takes place in the middle of the art world that spans between Montreal and the Eastern Townships.
As I live in Quebec, it was intriguing to listen to the unfolding of the investigation among ever stretching art community. I have encountered the insecure personality of the unfolding late blooming artist, stylist and of course painter.
The clarity of sound, the chapter positioning, truly kept me engaged in the story to the end.
This story unfolds the characters' lives as their surprising love for each other changes to regret and then there is the relevance of envy. As I listened to this murderous tale, the changing of possible suspects, I soon became hooked into rooting for Inspector Gamache and his associates through to the unveiling of this changing story.
The surprise ending starts to unfold before the last chapter and when you think you have it all worked out you haven't.
The artsy-fartsy world in the Eastern Townships was very well represented here and might just encourage a visit.
Well done and well read and enjoyable to listen too.
Published simultaneously: A Trick of the Light in hardcover by Minotaur Books.
Special thanks to Lynne Gordon for contributing her review of A Trick of the Light.
Acknowledgment: Macmillan Audio provided an audiobook of A Trick of the Light for this review.
Review Copyright © 2011 — Lynne Gordon — All Rights Reserved
Reprinted with Permission
Selected reviews of other mysteries by this author …
The Murder Stone
Minotaur Books (Hardcover), January 2009
ISBN-13: 9780312377021; ISBN-10: 0312377029
Location(s) referenced in A Trick of the Light: Montreal, Quebec
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A Trick of the Light by Louise Penny
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Format: Unabridged CD Audiobook
ISBN-10: 1-4272-1320-8
ISBN-13: 978-1-4272-1320-4
Publication Date: August 2011
List Price: $39.99
Synopsis (from the publisher): “Hearts are broken,” Lillian Dyson carefully underlined in a book. “Sweet relationships are dead.”
But now Lillian herself is dead. Found among the bleeding hearts and lilacs of Clara Morrow's garden in Three Pines, shattering the celebrations of Clara's solo show at the famed Musée in Montreal.
Chief Inspector Gamache, the head of homicide at the Sûreté du Québec, is called to the tiny Quebec village and there he finds the art world gathered, and with it a world of shading and nuance, a world of shadow and light. Where nothing is as it seems. Behind every smile there lurks a sneer. Inside every sweet relationship there hides a broken heart. And even when facts are slowly exposed, it is no longer clear to Gamache and his team if what they've found is the truth, or simply a trick of the light.