I don’t usually have an appetite for detective novels, but I was nonetheless curious to read the first novel in the Inspector Maigret series. While the plot of Pietr-le-Letton (1931) is meagre, featuring a caricatural villain from outside France, I enjoyed the atmosphere created by Georges Simenon, his play with identity and deception, as well as the streets of Paris in the background. It’s funny to realise that rue du Roi de Sicile was considered a bad area not even that long ago.

Since I previously appreciated Le train, I’ll stick to the author’s ‘romans durs’ next time.