Under the Channel

Although the characters are persuasive, and their plights familiar, the story is told is such a digressive way I never really got the focus. So much time is spent on the players, we never get to the plot. Also, we are inside the person I assume will be the victim - and a very unappealing character he is, smug and naive and heedless - and then suddenly we are in the mind of a policeman with wife problems - and fairly misogynist as well - and he's the one I assume will be doing the investigations. I had to stop! There are good descriptions of places, and inconsequential encounters that are nicely done, and the writing is intelligent but this really failed in its intention for me.

Under the Channel is a very unusual book. It is the story of a french policeman investigating the murder of an Englishman on the Eurostar. For some reason that isn't really clear, his investigation takes him to London where the murdered man lived. It's clear by the end that this book is more than a mystery. That, in fact, the murder takes second place to the policeman's own self exploration.

I didn't like the book very much but because of the unusual twist, I finished it. If I didn't know a french author had written this book, I would have thought it was a young American. The language was so unfrench. I live in Paris so I know this. The self talk of each of the characters felt extremely immature. And there were a lot of "Shits" every time something went wrong.

Sometimes when the writing is this bad and I know it's a translation, I wonder if part of the problem is the translator. I am not going to track down the french version to find out, I just wasn't interested enough in the book.

So I have to leave this by saying I don't recommend the book. There are too many good books and so little time as the saying goes.

Just awful. Very difficult to get into; exaggerated, unlikable victim, and then an even more unlikable 'detective.' Awkward style of writing (and/or compounded by an odd translation), but smooths out a bit after the middle; although the narrative continues to jump backward and forward. Self-obsessed characters with no redeeming features.
Uncomfortable mash-up of genres--
--not really a mystery, as the detective doesn't seem to know or care what he's doing, or seems to have any urgency to move forward and make progress on the case; works almost independently (if you can call it work); and repeatedly acts completely inappropriately, without seeming to suffer any consequences;
--kind of (but not really) the kind of 'mid-life crisis' novel that was popular a couple of decades ago , but the protagonist is so pathetic and unlikable, that it's difficult to either empathize or sympathize;
--bad example of the Gallic roman;
--etc.

Generally distasteful and I had to force myself to finish. Can't imagine who the audience is here. I can't recommend, and won't be posting a review.
Definitely not for me.

I'm not sure what to write about this book.

Is it a murder story?
Is it a police procedural?
Is it a love story?

It is rather confusing. However I liked the style of writing and the pace of the story.

Did detective Roland solve the story? Well in a way there is an answer, I won't say what it is for fear of spoiling the story.

I thank Netgalley and Gallic books for a copy in exchange for an honest review.

A very enjoyable read.

This is the first book by Gilles Pétel that I have read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The book is a slow moving, character driven crime story with a couple of nice twists at the end of it. Set in both London and Paris the story takes you on a journey with a crime, a marriage breakdown, adultery and the hedonistic life of London's gay scene. This is a well told, well paced story, that I would recommend to any lovers of a crime story well told.

When John Burny is murdered in a train mid-way through the Channel Tunnel, Parisian detective Roland Desfeuillères finds himself travelling to London to investigate, after the British police have washed their hands of the case. Desfeuillères leaves behind him a crumbling marriage from which he is glad to escape, and offers him a new future which he is more than willing to embrace.

This is a quaint novel which doesn't really live up to the 'police procedural' tag which it promises in its opening chapters. Nonetheless, it is an interesting read.

Thanks to Netgalley and Gallic Books for a review copy.