The 21st Inspector Gamache novel bring readers back to the familiar and loved cast of Three Pines, with the well-loved detective being woken by a panicked call, telling him of a body to be found in a remote area of wooded Quebec known as the Lost Nation.
When the site is finally found, it’s a bizarre sight: a dead man wearing clothing from the last century, lying on top of a grave with seedlings growing out of his clothes.
Even more startling, the genesis of the call appears to have originated from Gamache’s close friend and neighbor, artist Clara Morrow.
These early leads take the team on a wild search for not only those who are buried in the Lost Nation, but a maritime disaster that has bearing on the case, ancestors of Clara’s dead husband Peter Morrow, and at the heart of the matter, a Victorian botanist who curated a plant, now extinct.
The ghost of Miss Wolcott is indeed of great importance on several levels, as Gamache and his team investigate the man’s death, which will take them to France and England in addition to their Quebec universities. Miss Wolcott infuses their search at every step.
This is vintage Penny, a Gamache classic, and a real winner in both its complex plot and the humanistic themes it touches on. Wait until you’ve read the novel to read the Acknowledgments that give real insight how these plot lines came together for Penny.
Highly recommended.
