The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau

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Book 1 of The Gorski Novels
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Pub Date 17 Jul 2017 | Archive Date 3 Oct 2024
Saraband | Contraband

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Description

Introducing Detective Georges Gorski… From twice Booker-listed author of His Bloody Project and Case Study.

Manfred Baumann is a loner. Socially awkward and ill at ease, he spends his evenings surreptitiously observing Adèle Bedeau, the sullen but alluring waitress at his local bistro. But one day, she vanishes into thin air. When Detective Georges Gorski begins investigating her disappearance, Manfred’s repressed world is shaken to its core and he is forced to confront the dark secrets of his past.

The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau effortlessly conjures up an otherworldly atmosphere that simultaneously intrigues and unsettles. A compelling psychological portrayal of a peculiar outsider pushed to the limit by his own feverish imagination, it is by turns haunting, strange and mesmeric – Graeme Macrae Burnet’s acclaimed debut, a literary mystery novel that is well on its way to achieving cult status.

Introducing Detective Georges Gorski… From twice Booker-listed author of His Bloody Project and Case Study.

Manfred Baumann is a loner. Socially awkward and ill at ease, he spends his evenings...


Advance Praise

'A stylish, atmospheric mystery with a startling twist . . . satisfies like Simenon and surprises like Ruth Rendell. I can't give it any higher praise.' National Public Radio

'A brilliant character study of a social outcast and a creepy, twisting, deviously well-constructed story of intrigue and murder that reads like a lost classic.' Thomas Mullen, author of Darktown

‘A quietly relentless exploration of the complexities of guilt and the awkwardness and banality of evil. An intensely inventive novel, as subtle as it is shocking.' Ian McGuire, author of The North Water

'Graeme Macrae Burnet avoids the black and the white and paints a picture of a troubled, paranoid outsider drifting through the gray areas of life. He grabs the reader by the chin and holds them captive as they watch Manfred Baumann's life and psyche slowly unravel under the scrutiny of a detective’s eye.' Robin Yocum, author of Favorite Sons and The Essay

'A captivating psychological thriller ... Very accessible and thoroughly satisfying.' The Herald

'A strikingly singular talent' Scottish Book Trust

'A stylish, atmospheric mystery with a startling twist . . . satisfies like Simenon and surprises like Ruth Rendell. I can't give it any higher praise.' National Public Radio

'A brilliant character...


Available Editions

EDITION Ebook
ISBN 9781908643612
PRICE £6.99 (GBP)
PAGES 288

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Average rating from 2 members


Featured Reviews

“Gorski was used to being lied to. People lied as a matter of course and even when their lies were shown to be implausible, they were stubborn … What interested him was not so much the fact that someone lied, but how they behaved when they did so. Often people would reach for their cigarettes or become suddenly distracted by some irrelevant activity. They became incapable of maintaining eye contact. Women toyed with their hair. Men fingered their beards or moustaches.”

The Disappearance of Adele Bedeau is the first book in the Georges Gorski series by award-winning Scottish author, Graeme Macrae Burnet. Nineteen-year-old Adele Bedeau works as a waitress in the Restaurant de la Cloche in the Alsace border town of Saint-Louis. At the end of her Wednesday shift she changes her clothes before heading off. All the regulars notice when she repeats this the next night. But on Friday, she doesn’t turn up for work.

The regulars also noticed that Manfred Baumann, their socially awkward bank manager, complimented her on her appearance, something most out of character for him. Baumann soon realises that he could be a suspect, and is not quite sure why he lies to Chief Inspector Georges Gorski about the last time he saw Adele.

As Gorski investigates, he is, for reasons he can’t quite fathom, reminded of his first case as a detective, twenty years earlier: a case that saw an old tramp convicted of the murder of a sixteen-year-old girl. Gorski had never been fully convinced the right man was jailed. Meanwhile, Baumann starts acting a little strangely…

Macrae Burnet gives the reader a crime novel that is much more about the characters than about the crime being solved. The players are intimately drawn, their actions closely described, the mood of the town almost palpable and the setting thoroughly evoked, while the reader is left to reach their own conclusions on some aspects of the story.

Macrae Burnet paints Gorski as a cop with virtually no ambition and a distrust of intuition, but a Columbo-like doggedness and more perceptiveness than first impressions allow. Baumann’s escalating paranoia is depicted with consummate ease, and is, at times, darkly funny. Readers will also notice parallels between certain phases of the lives of Baumann, Gorski and author Brunet himself.

Readers in the habit of skipping the Translator’s Afterword are strongly advised not to do so in this case, as this oft-ignored incidental constitutes an essential (if tongue-in-cheek) part of the novel, providing a potted history of the French author (Raymond Brunet)’s life. This is literary crime at its best.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Saraband/Contraband.

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This was brilliant. I don't read many detective novels, but this was more literary fiction. Especially the French atmosphere and setting was extremely well done.

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