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Read Murder In Montmartre (2007)

Murder in Montmartre (2007)

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Genre
Rating
3.67 of 5 Votes: 3
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ISBN
1569474451 (ISBN13: 9781569474457)
Language
English
Publisher
soho crime

Murder In Montmartre (2007) - Plot & Excerpts

I didn't like this 6th book in Cara Black's Aimee Leduc series as well as the ones that came before but still enjoyed reading it.Private detective Aimee Leduc attends a retirement party for a flic (cop) who used to work with her father when he was on the Paris force. Her good friend Laure who she had known since childhood (their dads were both cops) is now a flic. Laure and her partner Jacques have a spat at the restaurant before he asks her to go with him as backup to meet an informant.Before the night is over, Jacques is dead of gunshot wounds on a roof, Laure is found nearby unconscious with gun powder residue on her hands, and they are found by Aimee who gets hauled to jail.The story features a lot of weird stuff as usual with Aimee trying to help a disinterested young lawyer to get a comatose Laure off the hook for murder which leads her to bluffing her way into the very center of police (under an assumed name), her partner Rene (the dwarf computer genius) getting on the roof with a 9 year old boy while passing as a famous artist, Aimee landing under the sheets with a homeless Corsican musician the police think is a terrorist and the usual evil cops and mecs on the street. The women are always dysfunctional in these books and this is no exception. The case suddenly drops Aimee closer to finding out the truth about her father's corruption case.

Computer detective Aimee Leduc just can't seem to stay out of trouble. This time, while she's trying to help clear a childhood friend, police officer Laure Rousseau, who has been accused of shooting her partner, Leduc runs afoul of Corsican separatists.The thing I like best about this series is Aimee herself. She's not perfect, having her own demons to manage (almost always relating to her father's death). This time, she's also wrestling with the fact that her boyfriend left her ... and with trying to get her clients to pay up on time so that she, the dog, and her business partner can eat.Cara Black always gets the details right on Paris (I have heard that she will walk around a given block 10 times to make sure she gets the businesses, etc., in the right place), as well as creating interesting "whodunnits." I find myself surprised by the reveal, more often than not ... and that takes some doing.The only challenge is that the books really do need to be read in order. I read two out of sequence and felt the lack of continuity quite distinctly. I highly recommend the series to Francophiles and mystery lovers alike ... but be sure to start with number one.

What do You think about Murder In Montmartre (2007)?

I read two of Cara Black's Aimee Leduc series some years ago, and although I don't have a sharp memory of either one, my general feeling is that they were "pretty good" stories with great atmosphere. I'm sorry I can't say the same about this one. Too many characters, jumbled all together without clear characterization and those great "refresher" details that allow the reader ro remember them the next time they appear. The plot was far-fetched and improbable, and not all that compelling. I never really came to care about any aspect of the story or any of the characters. Also, Leduc was not convincing as someone who could actually do all the physical acrobatics she was put through. Then came the ending - a very unsatisfactory resolution that left me pleased only to be done with the book.Someone recently complained that I never do negative reviews (except for WOLF HALL). I hope I'm not over-reacting to that criticism, but I really didn't think much of this book.
—Lewis Weinstein

Totally into this mystery series - Love the strong main character; a WOMAN private detective named Aimee Leduc. I find all of the books interesting and relatively fast-paced reads, but often they gte a bit muddled in the unraveling of the mystery and the dialogues between characters also is not always clear. You can't always tell who is the speaker - but nontheless, I still love the fact that it takes place in Paris and each book takes place in a different neighborhood of the city. Cara Black does a great job of setting the scene and giving a flavor for the people of the arrondissement. This book was interesting b/c it gave more insight to the ongoing mystery of Aimee's father's death, and introduces a new love interest for Aimee - but loves some steam at the end regarding the complicated scheme to smuggle arms to the Corsican Seperatists in Paris. I will continue to read the series though as I've gotten this far along, might as well keep going!
—Breen

Black has been incredibly clever in how she doles out the details of Aimee's father's violent death in the course of a surveillance-gone-horribly-wrong, she's building nicely to a better understanding of the Aimee-Rene dynamic, and has given us a delightfully stubborn (who can't relate to that?), clever and resourceful protagonist. In this outing, much of which occurs in/around Montmartre as the book's name implies, Aimee must investigate circumstances in which she became unwittingly involved so as to clear a childhood friend who is charged with the rooftop murder of her possibly-corrupt police partner. So it's the usual behind-the-scenes machinations of the different arms of the French government, the Byzantine dysfunction of the assorted arms of the French police, a disturbing surveillance program referred to as Big Ears, loads of Montmartre history and current demographics (including the music scene), and little bits of Corsican culture. All told, a tight storyline with marvelous sense of place. Onward to Murder on the Ile Saint-Louis!--which is esp. promising as that hits very close to home for Aimee given that it's where her apartment is located.
—Julie H.

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