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Feb 14, 2019gloryb rated this title 3.5 out of 5 stars
This novel is possibly the last Gamache novel is how I interpreted Penny's words in her Acknowledgment and understandably so. This novel completes the storyline of Gamache's drug bust, a feature in several of her other novels and, thank goodness, as it was getting "old/tiresome" to read about. Penny includes another storyline, more interesting to me, about the children of once wealthy Austrian families fighting over the contents of a deceased family member's will, but, as she presents these characters, there is a deeper undertow of their greedy character when a murder in the family is revealed. I chuckled when she has Gamache translating old news articles and a will from German to English. It didn't ring true to me with his French Canadian background. Readers have to like Penny's writing style as she uses phrases and clauses as sentences - most annoying to me - but it seems she writes as she speaks - in short bursts - a revelation upon reading her heartfelt Acknowledgment. She has a way of editorializing her characters' actions and thoughts which is quite different from other authors. I find that approach rather annoying, actually. Everything they do has some mystery/secrecy attached to be explained later. The novel takes place at wintertime - perfect, when experiencing a snowstorm at home.