Description
Book SynopsisInevitably Maigret was a hostile presence in the Majestic. He constituted a kind of foreign body that the hotel's atmosphere could not assimilate. Not that he looked like a cartoon policeman. He didn't have a moustache and he didn't wear heavy boots. His clothes were well cut and made of fairly light worsted.
Trade ReviewGem-hard soul-probes . . . not just
the world's bestselling detective series, but
an imperishable literary legend . . . he exposes secrets and crimes not by forensic wizardry, but by the melded powers of therapist, philosopher and confessor * Times *
Strangely comforting . . . so many lovely bistros from the Paris of mid-20th C. The corpses are incidental, it's the food that counts. * Margaret Atwood *
One of the greatest writers of the 20th century . . . no other writer can set up a scene as sharply and with such economy as Simenon does . . . the conjuring of a world, a place, a time, a set of characters - above all, an atmosphere. * Financial Times *
Simenon's supreme virtue as a novelist, to burrow beneath the surface of his characters' behaviour; to empathise . . . it is this unfailing humanity that makes the Maigret books truly worth reading. * Guardian *
Gripping . . .
richly rewarding . . . You'll quickly find yourself obsessing about his life as you tackle each mystery in turn -- Stig Abell * The Sunday Times *