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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Eyes of Nine" data-source="post: 9282590" data-attributes="member: 99786">Read Pietr-le-Letton aka Pietr the Latvian aka Maigret and the Engimatic Lett aka The (Strange) Case of Peter the Lett aka Suite at the Majestic. First Maigret book.As with any translation, the translation matters. This one is the 2013 translation by David Bellos. There were hints of Hemingway in that there were a bunch of short, punchy (sometimes literal) sentences/sentence fragments. It was an unusual English/American mystery novel in that the typical rhythm felt "off" in some way. That may have been on purpose, I don't know until I read more, which I will. Pros - Short novel. Maigret the character is very clear in my mind's eye. A big man who takes a licking and keeps on coming - sort of like a human bulldog. Mystery was pretty classic case of [ISPOILER]mistaken sibling identity[/ISPOILER], but fairly well executedCons - some parts of it were hard to believe. Like [ISPOILER]Maigret getting shot and then not attending to his wound for hours[/ISPOILER], and like [ISPOILER]the instantaneous sobering up of the eponymouss Pietr[/ISPOILER]. In addition seems like Maigret only works alone? Personally something I love in mysteries is the interaction of the main char and either a co-main or a side character. You've got Wimsey/Vane; Poirot/Hastings/Oliver/Japp; Wolf/Goodwin. And more modern tales like Louise Penny's Armand Gamache and his entire team; Elizabeth George's Inspector Linley/Sgt Havers; and even JK Rowling (blech)'s Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellicot[ISPOILER](the one character who looked like could be his sidekick dies halfway through the book. Maybe he never gets a sidekick again?) [/ISPOILER]That said, they are short, so I'll no doubt read vol 2: Le Charretier de "la Providence", this one translated I think by David Coward - we'll see which version the library has</blockquote>

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