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    A Fatal Grace: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel
    A Fatal Grace: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel
    A Fatal Grace: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel
    Audiobook10 hours

    A Fatal Grace: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel

    Written by Louise Penny

    Narrated by Ralph Cosham

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Winner of the 2007 Agatha Award for Best Novel!

    From the Dagger award winning author Louise Penny comes the second Armand Gamache mystery set in the stunning countryside of Quebec.

    Welcome to winter in Three Pines, a picturesque village in Quebec, where the villagers are preparing for a traditional country Christmas, and someone is preparing for murder.

    No one liked CC de Poitiers. Not her quiet husband, not her spineless lover, not her pathetic daughter—and certainly none of the residents of Three Pines. CC de Poitiers managed to alienate everyone, right up until the moment of her death.

    When Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, of the Sûreté du Quebec, is called to investigate, he quickly realizes he's dealing with someone quite extraordinary. CC de Poitiers was electrocuted in the middle of a frozen lake, in front of the entire village, as she watched the annual curling tournament. And yet no one saw anything. Who could have been insane enough to try such a macabre method of murder—or brilliant enough to succeed?

    With his trademark compassion and courage, Gamache digs beneath the idyllic surface of village life to find the dangerous secrets long buried there. For a Quebec winter is not only staggeringly beautiful but deadly, and the people of Three Pines know better than to reveal too much of themselves. But other dangers are becoming clear to Gamache. As a bitter wind blows into the village, something even more chilling is coming for Gamache himself.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Audio
    Release dateMay 6, 2014
    ISBN9781427258328
    A Fatal Grace: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel
    Author

    Louise Penny

    LOUISE PENNY is the author of the #1 New York Times, USA Today, and Globe and Mail bestselling series of Chief Inspector Armand Gamache novels, and coauthor with Hillary Rodham Clinton of the #1 New York Times bestselling thriller State of Terror. She has won numerous awards, including a CWA Dagger and the Agatha Award (nine times), and was a finalist for the Edgar Award for Best Novel. In 2017, she received the Order of Canada for her contributions to Canadian culture. Louise lives in a small village south of Montréal.

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    Reviews for A Fatal Grace

    4/5

    1,678 ratings135 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Wonderful Three Pines mystery solved by Inspector Ganache.
      I loved visiting with Clara, and my favorite Myrna.

      A relative newcomer to town is killed in a complicated fashion on Boxing Day. I don't want to do spoilers but it was intriguing and yet full of pathos.
    • 5/5
      Wonderful series, wonderful author, ending always a surprise.
    • 4/5
      I wish Penny wrote regular fiction. I thoroughly enjoy everything about her books except the "mystery" portion. The crimes are too unlikely, the unfolding all at the end. The characters and insight, however, are outstanding!
    • 4/5
      Another cold and snowy romp through Three Pines to catch a killer! OK. People get killed but it's never graphic or violent. There are so many heart-warming pages ... hearths, food and friends amidst the reality of human failures breeding loneliness and cold, dark insanity. Sadness, compassion and love balance the hate and pain making the story a satisfying read.Louise Penny does not skimp on characters. This book makes you think almost anyone could be a murderer - or an accomplice - for so many reasons. Something to ponder.I love the way Penny breathes life into her characters. Sometimes it seems there are too many, but I have the feeling some of them are being developed throughout the series. I guess this is part of the reason you want to move on to the next book. It really doesn't matter who is being killed. That's never the point. It comes down to why people do what they do. Penny's books are studies in human nature hidden in easy, delightful reading with the who dunnit aspect for flavor.
    • 2/5
      A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny; (1 1/2*)I read and enjoyed the first of Penny's series, but had to Pearl Rule this one at 50% read on my Kindle. It was so boring that I don't even want to discuss it. Sorry to the author and all of her fans. I know this was well received by most readers.I did enjoy the first enough that I may try the third.
    • 3/5
      This book has evocative descriptions of Quebec, not only of winter but also of Quebec’s unique culture (although it’s puzzling why the author changed the name of the Montreal Canadiens to an English spelling). It would be useful to have read Louise Penny’s first book Still Life as they appear to be a series although this is not mentioned anywhere in the book. In Dead Cold many of the characters are dark, unconventional, even eerie, which for me made them less than likeable. This is an obvious ploy to create characters that the reader can visualize in the role of murderer, however I had trouble visualizing them at all and had to keep referring back to earlier passages to try and fix the characters in my mind. On the other hand, the detective was compassionate, charming and very appealing – definitely a signature character and one the author would be wise to keep. There were references to earlier unresolved issues, the details presumably described in the first book, possibly to be followed up in a succeeding work, neither of which I find tempting. The plot was overly complicated, implausible and failed to conceal the obvious solution. Unfortunately, instead of coming to a resounding conclusion, I lost interest in the closing pages. Too bad, with editing this one could have been a winner.
    • 5/5
      Excellent second book in the Armand Gamache series. Narration could be less monotonous.
    • 4/5
      Penny seems off her rhythm in the first 60 or so pages, but stick with it: By page 65 the book transforms to the kind of magic she wrought in the first Three Pines mystery.
    • 4/5
      A decidedly unpleasant woman is murdered - electrocuted - in the middle of a crowd of people, and Armand Gamache must unravel the mystery. It's very much of a type with the first novel in the series: clear from relatively early on who the murderer must be, but wonderful characters, and some really funny moments on the side. One aspect of Penny's writing that adds to the pleasure of reading but reduces the mystery is that she structures her books to reinforce the main themes - so, for example, if motive for a murder will turn out to be jealousy, she'll set up a couple minor side plots that involve jealousy as well. It makes for greater depth and contrast in the story, but it also means one can 'solve' the mystery through meta-analysis by spotting new themes as Penny introduces them in the first few chapters. I'm curious to see if this changes as her writing continues to mature later in the series.
    • 4/5
      The second book in Penny's charming series featuring Armande Gamache, this story of an appalling woman who meets her well-deserved death in an extremely complicated fashion is far above the average detective series entry.Penny shines at character development, astute observations on life, and truly charming settings. She includes some sly humor and quite a bit of poetry in this book, both her own and from other women poets. Really an amazingly versatile writer, she presents the reader with intriguing mysteries and very believable, fascinating people.Highly recommended to anyone.
    • 3/5
      This one dragged a bit in comparison to the first book. I guessed the villain incorrectly. I found it was almost hard to care who did it when the "victim" was so despicable. An interesting look into human nature. I'm in this for the long haul. After all my 7th Grade English teacher recommended the series. At my age that is quite the privilege so I'm going to take the challenge.
    • 5/5
      I think it was even better than the first book in the series!❤️
    • 3/5
      I liked the first one a bit more. I was fairly sure who the murderer was fairly early on. I also found the allusions regarding a character's character based on their physical appearance off-putting.
    • 5/5
      I read "Still Life", the first of the Gamache novels, last year and enjoyed it very much. "A Fatal Grace" is even better! I loved this novel from the first to the last page!The plot is quite interesting, although it is nothing completely new: A woman who only moved to the village of Three Pines a year ago is murdered during the Christmas curling match. She was not liked particularly well, so there seem to be many suspects. Gamache travels to Three Pines to investigate and of course he meets many people he knows from the last case, as well as a few he hasn't met before. The murder was quite gruesome because it was done by electricity - but how could that happen in such a public place?While the case kept getting more exciting throughout the course of the novel, what appealed to me most was the community of Three Pines, the different characters, their background stories. Every single detail just felt right to me and when I had finished the novel, I did not want to leave. There is a magic about it, about Penny's style and the people she creates. I am already looking forward to reading the third book of this series.
    • 4/5
      I so enjoy Penny's sense of humor and her characters are top notch. She shows such love and compassion for humanity without shying away from the cruelty that people too often inflict on one another and on ourselves. I thought this plot was very unique. I'm looking forward to reading the next book in the series to see how Penny develops the main characters. You'll learn a bit about the sport of curling in the book.
    • 4/5
      Wheels within wheels are turning -- I love how this series can be so cozy, so thoughtful, so sweet but never saccharine, but there's also this dark undercurrent that promises more larger story to come. In this book, we learn more about the choices Inspector Gamache made in the past, and see if he makes the same choice again. We also see the wages of child abuse, reflected again and again throughout generations. Sad, lovely, full of heart.
    • 5/5
      An absolutely odious woman moves to Three Pines with her milquetoast husband and her emotionally battered young daughter and has the entire town hating her in record time, it seems. So when she is murdered in the middle of a town festival, Gamache knows he has his work cut out for him to find the killer while also trying to solve the murder of a homeless woman back in Quebec. Lots of suspects, several red herrings, and some great twists to this one. I adore all the characters (not you, Yvette), especially Gamache, and despite the ridiculous murder rate, I so badly want to live in Three Pines.
    • 4/5
      Chief Inspector Armand Gamache has to return to the village of Three Pines when a new resident is found dead at a Boxing Day curling match attended by nearly everyone in the village. The initial assumption was that she had succumbed to a heart attack, but forensic investigation reveals that she was actually electrocuted.Three Pines seems an idyllic spot, although it does seem to have a disproportionately high number of murders. In this instance, the dead woman had only lived there very briefly but had already established herself as very unpopular, being seen as deeply selfish and utterly dismissive of her neighbours.Gamache is his usual, thoughtful self, and quickly sets about trying to establish the back story to the death. Meanwhile, as part of his annual ritual, he is also looking into an unsolved case assigned to one of his counterparts in a different precinct. They have done this for years, swapping their outstanding cases in the hope that a new eye might spot something hitherto unnoticed. The colleague’s case involves the death of a homeless woman on the streets of Montreal. As luck would have it, several of the residents of Three Pines had passed by her usual pitch on the day that she died.Reading through what I have just typed I feel, as is so often the case, that the synopsis makes the book seem rather trivial, which is to do it a disservice. Through the character of Gamache, Louise Penny manages a deep investigation of the range of human emotions. The relationships between the villagers seem well observed and highly credible.
    • 3/5
      I was entertained by this, but I wasn't quite as engaged as I wanted to be. So I was curious how things would end up, and made my guesses, but ultimately I didn't care terribly who had done it or how it was solved. It was good enough that my mind wasn't wandering away, but nothing was all that memorable for me in the end. I will definitely continue with the series though.
    • 4/5
      Winter like murder has arrived in Three Pines. CC de Poitiers is dead, murdered, but how and why. Suspects are aplenty considering that she was universally disliked in the village.
      Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, of the Sûreté du Québec, is charged with the investigation, but who was CC de Poitiers.
      A very enjoyable well-written mystery.
    • 4/5
      Not surprisingly, I am really enjoying this Gamache series. I am planning on reading many of them this year as I am just craving this kind of mystery plus the wonderful charachter building Penny has already done in just the first two books.I love the village regulars. I love the setting of Three Pines and the life with the cozy fireplaces - the wonderful bistro with its delicious sounding meals - and the added fun of a mystery that is easy to follow and I actually feel like I am guessing away as evidence is revealed.The reason this fell short of 5 stars - was the reveal to me. The whole book was very well paced - and the end seemed really hurried and a bit out in left field to me. Even with that - I am looking forward to reading the next one and settling back into the world of Three Pines.
    • 4/5
      Her books have been compared favorably to Agatha Christie, and I even did so after reading the first one. I have not changed my mind aftert the second, but would rather augment by saying that her books are a hybrid of Christie with the warmth of the Jan Karon books. There is mystery, in similar vein to Christie, but there is something about this little village of Three Pines. As Gamache says at the end of this book, "I am at peace." And that is the definite vibe that you get with Penny, no matter how much murder and mayhem, Gamache moves at a pace that still embraces life and finds the beauty and peace all around him, even in the midst of chaos. This was a great story and just when I thought I had it deduced, she stunned me! On to the next one...
    • 4/5
      Yes, I listened to this one in a day...and it's not a short novel. Let's just say I'm kind of glad I can't get my hands on the third book right now. I have to get *something else* done today! Gripping and wonderful.
    • 4/5
      Too bad about the fatphobia. I mostly enjoyed this all the way through, though I felt there was one too many twists at the end. I love spending time with these characters and the way of life in Three Pines.
    • 3/5
      The author irks me. Every so often she moves me to tears, I want to know what happens next / who dunn it, some of her characters are so beautifully drawn, and then at other times she's annoying me, I can't wait for the current scene to be over, and I can't tell the characters apart.

      I don't think it helps (particularly with this book) that I was listening to an audio version from Audible. There were certain elements of the book which were both more confusing and also easier to notice when heard aloud, and I spent much of the book wondering Why the Author Would Be Doing This and thinking This Better Be Important Or I'll Be Really Frustrated, etc. I can't say more without spoilerage. Also, she picks up various points of view and then discards them along the way, which leads one to suspect that The Killer Will Be One of The People We No Longer Hear From, and that narrows the field substantially.

      Characters that were particularly distinctive (excuse my spelling, I have no idea beyond hearing their names):
      Cisi dePoitier, her husband, her daughter
      The bag lady (Elle or El or L?)
      Agent Yvette Nicole
      Ruth Zarrdo

      Characters I couldn't tell apart
      Any other policeman
      Three old ladies (K. or Kay, Mother B or Bee or Bea, Em or Emme) and Myrna(Myrtle? my bad memory), a.k.a. friends of Clara
      Two gay bistro owners

      And then the rest of the characters occupied that middle ground of "I know who they are, but they're not particularly riveting."

      Add to that a particularly (unnecessarily) elaborate murder, and I was a bit annoyed for much of the book. The elaborate murder especially bothered me, because I expected the solution would hinge on some necessity for the elaboration, but no, poison or gunshot or candelstick in the den would all have sufficed.

      (Note: 5 stars = amazing, wonderful, 4 = very good book, 3 = decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. I'm fairly good at picking for myself so end up with a lot of 4s). I feel a lot of readers automatically render any book they enjoy 5, but I grade on a curve!
    • 3/5
      The inspector unravels the mystery behind the death of a woman electrocuted on iced-over lake.
    • 1/5
      A FATAL GRACE Rating 1*THE CRUELLEST MONTH Rating 2* In these two books, the second and third in the Chief Inspector Gamache series by Louise Penny, the quaint nativity of the first book in the series has descended into an unsophisticated humour (Frozen dog poop? Really?), which sits uneasily with gratuitous quotes from the literary greats. The poetic/classical inserts and re-cycled homilies became irritating and the repetitive descriptions created a pace so slow I was left almost catatonic.There is very little ambiguity in these characters; it’s ambiguity that makes truly evil villains and truly great heroes in literature or genre fiction. Most of these characters are too flippant and shallow; even the nice people show the worst of petty human traits. [“Clara tried to stay hidden behind Myrna hoping the fiends would find her friend first.”]The writing has a mean and arrogant streak as bad as the characters with their exaggerated extremes of good (Chief Inspector Gamache) or bad (Agent Nichol) traits. In book 2, the targets are self-published authors and people with weight problems; in book 3, the targets are (again) people who have a weight problem [“There on the screen was a long list of Googled sites, all offering to ship perfectly safe ephedra to anyone desperate and stupid enough to want it.”] These kinds of remarks, and others that litter the stories, make me uncomfortable, and reduce my enjoyment of what would otherwise be a good story.Although Inspector Gamache is an appealing character, and the mysteries are good, I will not be continuing with this series despite having bought the next four books in an omnibus.
    • 3/5
      Good read during Covid isolation but not my favorite Gamache novel.
    • 4/5
      nother great addition to this detective mystery series, with the same warm tone of author, and more observations on life by the intrepid chief inspector, delicious meals to at least imagine! eating, and the village characters...
    • 4/5
      Love this town! I almost threw the book across the room 10 pages from the end... but Louise Penny worked it out again. This one was a little easier to figure out than her first Armand Gamache book- but maybe that's because I had an easier time with the names of the characters. And in true Penny fashion, left a little bit unsolved... to be continued!