The Children Return

 The Children Return is the 7^th book in the Bruno series by Martin Walker. Once again, I chose the audiobook format with Robert Ian McKenzie as the most capable narrator. This book deals with the rapid infusion of Muslims into France which reached about 10% of the whole population. There were perceived problems from widely different angles depending on ones prejudices. An undercover Muslin agent was found murdered, and a young man, Sami, who had grown up in St. Denis. He was probably autistic, but he had always been mechanically gifted. As he grew up, he disappeared from the school system and some years later, was found in Afghanistan. He was thought to have been radicalized and put to the task of bombmaking against the allied forces that had come to Afghanistan. Sami came to the surface when he was trying to escape the Afghan war and return to St. Denis. It was Bruno who helped him get to France. As a young man, Sami was suspected of having been put to work by the Taliban as a highly skilled bombmaker. The allied forces called him “the engineer.” Bruno had to figure out who Sami really was so that he could protect the people of his home town.

I thought this book was a fair and unbiased look into the issues of a largely different but large  minority moving into a country. How much does each side of the immigration question have to adapt. It’s a very good book and I highly recommend it.

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The Resistance Man

 The Resistance Man is the sixth book in the Bruno series by Martin Walker. I think the review I read in Audible probably best describes the intrigue that the author provided. I’m cheating by using a quote from another source, but if you’ve been following my reviews of this series, you’ll surely forgive me for taking this shortcut. I may have done this once before in the 1934 reviews that we’ve posted. I continue to be well entertained by this series. 

“It's summer in St. Denis for chief of police Bruno Courrèges, and that means a new season of cases. This time there are three weighing on his mind. First, there’s the evidence that a veteran of the French Resistance is connected to a notorious train robbery; then, the burglary of a former British spymaster's estate; and, finally, the murder of an antiques dealer whose lover is conveniently on the lam.

“As Bruno investigates, it becomes clear that they are connected--however, figuring out how will take every skill he possesses. Add in juggling the complex affections of two powerful women, maneuvering village politics, and managing his irrepressible puppy, Balzac, and Bruno has his hands full once again.”

I listened to the audiobook format which was once again narrated by the very capable Robert Ian MacKenzie. Another important reason for my enjoyment of this series which takes place in rural France is that the author skillfully ties the location of the small village and its inhabitants to past wars. Geography is an important topic in all of these books. Thus, while St. Denis is a rural village, it has not been free from traumas in the world which have left scars on its population.

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The Devil's Cave

 The Devil’s Cave is the fifth book in the Bruno series by Martin Walker. If you’ve been following my reviews of the first four books in this 21-novel series, you’ll know I’m hooked, and yes, I’ve already downloaded the sixth book, all of which I’ve enjoyed in audiobook format by the excellent narrator Robert Ian MacKenzie. This book opens with a dead woman floating down a river towards St. Denis. The formerly beautiful woman was lying face up for the world to see her nakedness. Her identity was the first mystery in the story. Then there were the satanic symbols that marked her body.

Complicating the story was a domestic physical abuse case, the promise of a high end real estate development that just might keep this small town afloat (unlike so many countryside towns which had been abandoned), and the return of the Red Countess who had a long and very controversial history dating back to before WWII.

Once again, the author Martin Walker has provided an excellent plot with the further development of the usual cast of characters, Bruno, Isabelle, Pamela, J.J., the Baron, and the news photographer. Importantly, a new basset hound Balzac is introduced along with Hector, Bruno’s horse. I am fully entertained by these stories.

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Black Diamond

 Black Diamond is the third novel in the Bruno, Chief of Police series by Martin Walker. See the reviews of the first two books which I've written recently. Once again, the narrator is the wonderful voice of Robert Ian MacKenzie. I’ve obviously gotten hooked by the team work of Walker and MacKenzie, so I’ve already gotten the next two books. I suppose you could read the books out of order or to consider them stand alone books, but I think reading them in the order of publication is very entertaining as the reader has a chance to learn about Bruno and his cohorts in the order the author intended.

As we learn more about the delightful life in rural France, we learn a lot about their cuisine and their wines, all of which seem to be more important to Bruno than many of the murder mystery characters that I’ve read in the past. In this book Bruno, a single man, continues his romantic entanglements, and it is clear that he loves life in St. Denis as much as anything else. One of his favorite culinary treats are truffles, and Walker spends some time explaining how they are best prepared. As the Chinese have discovered truffles, the value of them has increased several fold. It’s the truffle market that provides the scene for one of Bruno’s friends. Bruno is determined to solve that crime. The continued development of Bruno’s character and the cast that surrounds him is most enjoyable. The unfolding of the plot is done perfectly. Just planned to get hooked on this series the way I have. The next two books which I'll start shortly are The Crowded Grave and The Devil’s Cave. 

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The Dark Vineyard

 I recently reviewed the first book in the Martin Walker 21-book series, Bruno, Chief of Police. I was so excited about the quality of that murder mystery novel, that I quickly acquired through the app Libby the second book The Dark Vineyard, published in 2009, a year after the first one. I see that author Walker has written a book a year since then, so assuming the quality of his stories continues there’s lots to look forward to.

Chief of Police Bruno Courreges is the only police officer in the small rural village of Saint-Denis located in the Perigord region in southwestern France. He has learned to love the quiet and intimate life in the village. Bruno only spoke a limited amount of English, which was all he needed in the countryside. The intense romantic relationship that Bruno had begun with police investigator Isabelle Perrault was interrupted as the result of her transfer back to her home base in Paris. That interruption seemed to be a great disappointment to both of them. But Bruno did not like the idea of living in Paris, and Isabelle was ambitious and thought working in Paris would provide her with the best chance at promotion.

As author Walker described delightful day-to-day life in Saint-Denis, there were frequent references to the local cuisine and many references to wine that might be consumed at any time of day. This second book started over a special vineyard where GMO crops were being tested, but many of the locals were not happy about it. While this venture was supposed to be kept secret, there really were not many secrets in this small village. When the crops were torched by an arsonist, it became a worldwide story. It turned out a large international producer of wines was considering making a major land purchase in Saint-Denis which surely would have changed the quality of life there. Some of the locals including the mayor saw the opportunity make a lot of money, but others were against the changes that this huge industry would bring

We learned about a cast of characters that included locals who worked in various businesses and people from the large wine company. It was when this quiet town experienced two deaths of longstanding beloved villagers that the tale got most interesting. Meanwhile, Bruno struggled with missing the wonderful relationship he had been building with Isabelle, as well as his attraction to one of the women who had made Saint-Denis her home of choice.

This book masterfully revealed a great plot and the developed a fascinating cast. Once again, the narrator of this audiobook was Robert Ian MacKenzie, and he was fantastic. I might just have to keep following Mr. MacKenzie for whatever books he narrates. Now, I will get my hands on Bruno book #3, Black Diamond.

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Bruno, Chief of Police: A Novel of the French Countryside

 Bruno, Chief of Police is a current day story that quickly ties into a WWII event. Bruno is the protagonist who is the Chief of Police in a small rural village in France. In fact, he’s the only police officer in the village. This is the first in a 21-book series authored by Martin Walker. I chose to get the audiobook format, and the narrator is Robert Ian MacKenzie. Considering all the audiobooks that I’ve consumed, it’s not a small compliment to write that he’s a good as any narrator that I’ve heard, and that includes Tom Hanks in the book The Dutch House by Ann Patchett. It’s an 8-hour, 52-minute listen. This first novel was first published in 2008.

Bruno Courreges is fully enjoying the quiet life he’s living in St. Denis. Previously, he was seriously injured by a sniper during the Balkan War. He had a past love who was killed in the same battle in which he was injured. He arrived in St. Denis as a single young man. He came to know of two men who had been resistance fighters during WWII, but rather than having become great friends, they never acknowledged one another. Then one of them, an Algerian who had fought on behalf of the French resistance in WWII was brutally murdered, and a swastika was carved into the victim’s chest.

As a result of the murder and the investigation that followed, it became apparent that the village was harboring some longstanding secrets and racial prejudices. The murdered man was an Arab, and in France at the current time, there is a growing ultraright movement against all immigrants. Meanwhile, Bruno found himself becoming very attracted to a woman investigator who had been sent from Paris to St. Denis to help with the investigation.

The author provided a cast of the most interesting characters, and Bruno’s ability to interact with a wide variety people turned out to be one of the reasons that I came to like him so much. I’m quite excited to find yet another author with an extensive body of work that I can look forward to. enjoying It’s my plan to find the second book in the series, The Dark Vineyard, and if the second book is as good as the first, then I have a lot of joy coming my way.

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The Coldest Case by Martin Walker

The setting called the Perigord, a rural southwestern corner of France, perhaps a 90 minute drive from Bordeaux, and follows the local valley police detective Bruno. Looks like the region is somewhat famous for its prehistoric relics. Bruno's chief, who goes by J-J, keeps a photo of a skull on his door to remind him of an unsolved case from 30 years ago when J-J was new on the force. The identity of the victim and the killer have evaded him for three decades. 

After viewing a museum display about what neanderthals might've looked like, based on anthropological reconstructions, Bruno enlists the renowned anthropologist's aid in doing the same thing with J-J's skull. A student is given the assignment and travels to the Perigord region of France. Her arrival, along with some dogged investigation of media photographs of various festivals of the day, the DNA from the skull (those techniques weren't available back then), and records searches of any database they can find identify the alleged killer and victim, both of whom have/had connections with the cold war era East Germany.

The investigative aspects of this story are quite interesting and entertaining. My problem was that the author spends almost as much time on life in the Perigord as that on the cold case. Page after page after page after page about Bruno jogging with his dog, riding his horse with neighbors, wine selection-tasting-discussion-reminiscing-production yadda yadda yadda, and cooking. Bruno is quite the cook and the author let's us know in no small detail what does into planning, preparing, cooking, serving, sampling, eating, and of course the accompanying wine options. I'd bet the book's content was nearly half and half the cold case and life in the region. And I can't forget to mention that the region is France's version of Southern California when it comes to summer wildfires season, the preparations, assignments, logistics, and the ever present 'improvise-overcome-adapt' that the towns have to do when a wildfire approaches. I really wasn't interested in the good life of the Perigord and would skip dozens and dozens of pages unrelated to the actual subject of the book. The cold war connections are interesting from a Charm School by Nelson Demille (the best espionage book I've ever read) or the TV show The American's perspective.

Walker is the author of what appears to be 14 other Bruno stories and about a half dozen non-fiction books, so he is an established writer with a following of significant size to keep him turning out Detective Bruno books. Now if the author's intent was to portray the comings and goings of what could well be an idyllic region of France, then he was successful. I just wasn't that interested. 

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