Jon Morgan is a retired police Superintendent and francophile who, it is said, has consequently seen almost everything awful that people can do to each other. He relishes quality writing in all genres but advises particularly on police procedure for authors including John Harvey and Jon McGregor. Haunts bookshops both new and secondhand and stands with Erasmus: “When I have a little money, I buy books; and if I have any left, I may buy food and clothes.”
Part thriller, part advert for this
wonderful and very historic (and I mean prehistoric) part of France, and part
recipe book, this latest outing for Bruno has all the ingredients (sorry) which
have garnered him such a huge fan base in the UK and abroad.
Bruno Courrèges, Chief of Police (sounds grand but
this is France and the Police Municipale) for several villages in the Dordogne
has, on the surface an ideal job with great friends, a supportive boss (the
Machiavellian ex-Senator) and excellent relationships with both his local
constituency and further afield in the Police Nationale, Gendarmerie and in the
French Intelligence services. He is a brilliant cook, a decorated former French
soldier, a good all round sportsman, fairly lucky in his various relationships
with women and the owner of a highly intelligent Basset hound.
Called to a seemingly non-suspicious sudden death
of a local sheep farmer, known as a ladies man even into his seventies, Bruno
uncovers dark forces at work which lead him to suspect foul play and he uses
all his professional skill and guile to hold those responsible to account and
achieve justice for the disinherited family of the deceased.
En route, his enquiries touch on global and local
issues including the Ukraine issue, Émigré Russian oligarchs, corruption at EU
state level and an ageing British rock star – the latter will have you trying
to find who the character is based on. Inevitably in this thirteenth outing for
Bruno he will again have his heart broken, cook some damn good meals, which
will have you salivating as you read – not attractive if in company – and
resolve the issues to the benefit of the local community in the commune of St
Denis. He even manages to get both himself and Balzac, his Basset hound, ‘in
stud’ as well!
I have loved Martin Walker’s work since the 1980’s,
whether it be his earlier journalism for the Guardian and the books he produced
on the Soviet Union under Gorbachev or his fiction which is mainly
Dordogne-based. Some may argue that the Bruno books are becoming, or have
always been, a little formulaic. This may be true, but it is also the reason
they work so well. You are on familiar territory and there are few who would
not wish to live in such a beautiful area of France, albeit that the world’s
problems do seem to end up there with alarming regularity.
They are good entertainment and an escape from our
own, sometimes humdrum. reality, with the added bonus of the recipes, the
scenery, the people and the history. Bruno is a man who knows what he likes,
likes what he knows, knows his own limits and is content to live within them.
Food for thought!
