{"id":3157,"date":"2026-09-08T12:37:25","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T12:37:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wp_stories\/?p=2779"},"modified":"2026-11-09T06:10:08","modified_gmt":"2026-11-09T06:10:08","slug":"beautiful-mystery-2012-louise-penny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpgreen\/?p=3157","title":{"rendered":"Beautiful Mystery (2012) Louise Penny"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This book starts with a few pages about a complicated romance between characters we know well, … then it segues into what we came for, the murder-solving part of the book!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The two books I just finished before this one each had a complicated romance going on in the background and sometimes in the foreground, and it’s worn me out a little on the romance thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two books ago was a Cormoran Strike<\/strong> novel<\/a> where the STILL unconsummated romance between him and and his business partner Robin consumes probably 40% of the words in this very large book!. They each consistently misread what’s going on in the other’s heads, and their nattering on about it consumed more pages than the size of most of the books I read! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The last book was a new Michael Connelly<\/a><\/strong> saga where he trots out a new protagonist<\/em>: a Bosch-like L A County Sheriff’s detective banished to Catalina Island for being … well … Bosch-like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He has an unremarkable relationship with the harbor master until she was abducted and almost murdered just because she knew our hero. So we hear a lot about that romance for a while.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

… but I digress …
like the song says, Love Ain’t Easy I guess … <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On to this book!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How it starts<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The familiar second in command of the Gamache novels, Jean-Guy Beauvior<\/strong>, is shtupping the bosses daughter! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, Inspector Gamache’s daughter Annie<\/strong> who was a middle-schooler when the first of these books was written, is all growed up and making her own decisions!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For reasons known only to the author, Annie and the 10 years older Beauvoir have fallen deeply in love …to the point of thinking about marriage and babies, all that stuff. Yet neither can quite find the courage to tell Gamache, or god forbid, Madame Gamache!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

p 11 They are having a pleasant post-coital Saturday morning swapping funny stories about the boss\/dad Gamache, when he calls Jean-Guy to tell him: “There’s been a murder”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Getting to the Murder<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The next chapter opens with Gamache and Beauvoir bouncing across the surface of a remote Canadian lake in an aluminum skiff driven by a local fishing guide. The are accompanied by the local Surete Inspector and are on their way to a remote monastery sitting all by itself at the far end of the lake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

19 “the near-mythical monastery of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups.”
“The home of two dozen cloistered contemplative monks who built their abbey as far from civilizationas they could get<\/em>“.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

24 Once they’re inside, the place is magical, joyous. The builders were into colored glass in the high-up windows, creating dancing prisms of light everywhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The monks however are utterly un-joyous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

28 Finally, after tedious series of locked door they meet the abbot and see the body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

29 Beauvior and Charbonneau (the local policeman) unpack their Scene of the Crime equipment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These French nouns are three times as long and four times harder to spell. They are wearing me out<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dead guy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

… is Brother Mathieu … Frere Mathieu<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was the director of their world-renowned choir. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gamache was listening to them in the plane trip up here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

30 Millions have heard (but not seen!) them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was second in command to the abbot, Dom Philippe<\/strong>. A map of the layout of this monastery would have been a great thing to include in the book, beause it’s all pretty hazy to me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The body was found in an outdoor courtward, curled up beside a fountain. The courtyard was part of the abbot’s quarters. The regular monks would have no reason to ever be there, except for the fellow whose job it was to rake the leaves and tidy up the garden. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He is who found the body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

35 At the start of the next chapter there’s sort of a flashback, where Gamache notices how much healthier and happier Beauvoir seems to be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Compared to what you ask<\/em>??
He evidently was injured in a previous book, got hooked on pain pills and generally had been in a bad place for a while. We know what Gamache doesn’t yet, that part of his healing and happiness is from the relationship with G’s daughter!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beauvoir thinks about it all the time, but never brings it up with Gamache. … Plenty of time for that when they get back from the wilderness….<\/p>\n\n\n\n

62 … which may be harder than they thought!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

64 When they arrived, they asked the boatman to wait, as the plan was to wrap up by 5PM and take the body back to civilization and be out of there by the end of the day. They collect all the equipment and the body , but there is no one there to can open the front gate!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Penny has a thing she does where she takes some simple event (like the monks being in another part of the building) and makes it sound like a really big deal for a few pages. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So it was made to sound really dramatic, but it was actually a pretty simple problem that worked out pretty well:<\/p>\n\n\n\n