The Strange Case of Peter the Lett (French: Pietr-le-Letton) is a 1931 detective novel by the Belgian writer Georges Simenon. It is the first novel to feature Inspector Jules Maigret who would later appear in more than a hundred stories by Simenon and who has become a legendary figure in the annals of detective fiction.
I'm glad I didn't start with this book when discovering Maigret, it's the first book in a very long series, so it's more interesting as an example of how a writer develops as they write more books.
The writing isn't as good, the world isn't as lived in, and the supporting characters are still being figured out. At the same time, the seed of all their potential is there, so it's fun to see the ideas in their infancy.
As a very short light read it's still a totally fine time though.
This one didn’t quite work for me but was a short, easy read with some nice noir elements so I still enjoyed it and would read more to see if the writing got more consistent later in the series (I understand there are dozens of them).
The text is a bit gushy (peppered with exclamation marks) and the climax is marred by a big info dump. Maigret is a detective whose greatest skill seems to psyching out the bad guys by making his presence as obvious as possible. He shrugs off a bullet wound, preferring a towel, some booze and some morphine to a hospital trip.
There are a couple of paragraphs about Maigret’s home life but you really don’t learn much about him except that he is unflappable, has a grudging respect for the bad guys, and is good at hiding in …
The first Maigret novel by Georges Simenon.
This one didn’t quite work for me but was a short, easy read with some nice noir elements so I still enjoyed it and would read more to see if the writing got more consistent later in the series (I understand there are dozens of them).
The text is a bit gushy (peppered with exclamation marks) and the climax is marred by a big info dump. Maigret is a detective whose greatest skill seems to psyching out the bad guys by making his presence as obvious as possible. He shrugs off a bullet wound, preferring a towel, some booze and some morphine to a hospital trip.
There are a couple of paragraphs about Maigret’s home life but you really don’t learn much about him except that he is unflappable, has a grudging respect for the bad guys, and is good at hiding in alleyways and looking moody.
The antagonist is an interesting, dark, flawed, complicated character and the scenes he shares with Margret (knocking back pints of rum and absinthe) are great fun.
PIETR THE LATVIAN commences the latest entire series audio quest, having now finished the much loved Discworld novels. I'm also aware I've got a few other series underway in this quest - mostly they've lapsed because I'm easily distracted, or because they've failed to hold interest. This first Maigret outing definitely held interest, not always in the way I was expecting though.
Maybe it's just me, but the anti-semitism and the casual racism in this audio really jarred, so much so that there was a point when I thought I'm going to have to abandon this quest at the opening salvo. Cheating a little and looking through a lot of commentary and reviews, I was convinced me to press on, mostly because so many people find Maigret such a compelling character - which he most definitely is.
This introduction to Maigret brings to life a slightly grumpy lone wolf type …
PIETR THE LATVIAN commences the latest entire series audio quest, having now finished the much loved Discworld novels. I'm also aware I've got a few other series underway in this quest - mostly they've lapsed because I'm easily distracted, or because they've failed to hold interest. This first Maigret outing definitely held interest, not always in the way I was expecting though.
Maybe it's just me, but the anti-semitism and the casual racism in this audio really jarred, so much so that there was a point when I thought I'm going to have to abandon this quest at the opening salvo. Cheating a little and looking through a lot of commentary and reviews, I was convinced me to press on, mostly because so many people find Maigret such a compelling character - which he most definitely is.
This introduction to Maigret brings to life a slightly grumpy lone wolf type detective, haunted by his decisions and dogged in his pursuit of the truth. The plot was interesting, and the detection methods, with surveillance and stakeouts playing a big part, and strikingly, the use of detailed written descriptions of suspects. Everything is played out against a dark, damp (often pouring rain) Paris, that seems as repressed and dogged as Maigret on occasions.
Discomfort aside, there are a lot of books in the Maigret series, and the quest will continue for the moment, as there is much commentary about the differences in each novel.
Perhaps it was a mistake to read the very first Maigret book in the series. I’m sure Simenon got better. Judged as a mystery, it’s rather silly and improbable. There’s also ridiculous physicality — Maigret is shot in the chest early in the book. He just keeps going, without sleep for days, and doing athletic things, and gets surgery at the end. It is STUNNINGLY antisemitic.
