Welcome To Three Pines

January 24, 2012

If you are like me and love Agatha Christie, check out Louise Penny. She writes a great mystery series set in Canada, mostly around a fictional town called Three Pines. Three Pines is a little town that nobody goes to on purpose. But everyone who finds their way there, tends to stay forever. It is a haven for Anglo and Franco phones alike, artists, poets, burned out bankers and psychiatrists, and any other misfit or lost soul out there. They have no crime, except murder.

Armand Gamache is the head of the homicide unit of the Surete du Quebec. He loves Three Pines and its inhabitants. He is a big man who loves food, his wife, children, and dog. He has a knack for taking the worst officers in the Surete and turning them into the best detectives there are. He is drawn to the outsider, which is why he fits into Three Pines perfectly, even if he doesn’t live there. Each murder in Three Pines tests his skills as a detective as well as a person.

Louise Penny is a marvelous storyteller. Each of her books is not only a mystery but a great lesson in Canadian history. She draws wonderful characters and lively but intricate storylines that keep the reader guessing and intrigued to the end.

Karen Wickwire
Interlibrary Loan Manager