Murder Below Montparnasse

Je t'aime Aimée!!

That Aimée! I love everything about her. She lives in an antiquated Parisian apartment and has a perchance for vintage fashion labels. I adore her fashion descriptions. Like her vintage black Chanel jacket, a signature affectation. If I can't have Paris at the very least I would like Aimée’s vintage clothing. She chooses the wrong men, the right friends, and her wardrobe is always one that I'm envious of. Her love affairs fail, her personal life is a mess, she fights with and uses the police, she is determined and shrewd, a loyal friend and a great character.
When Saj and Aimée run down a mysterious man, Aimée has fears of Serb or Russian gangs being involved. Was the unknown Serb’s death really a result of the show more accident or something more sinister? On the trail of a undiscovered painting of Lenin by Modigliani, bodies once more litter her investigative path. Meanwhile Renee has departed for Silicon Valley and glory where ambition and greed collide. Now Aimée is enmeshed in a dangerous case with only Saj to help.
Aimée Leduc has brilliant and creative investigative strengths, but at heart is a lonely waif continually turning towards the whispered mystery of the mother who abandoned her. Aimée’s mother is a ghost on her psyche's horizon...
Aimée chases dangerous shadows and thugs around the dark places of Paris in high heeled boots, along cobblestoned alleyways, through dubious ivy trailing courtyards and climbs over broken down walls or zips around narrow Parisian streets n her trusty Vesper. Other times she might rely on her taxi karma to escape a tricky situation.
Aimée Leduc is a woman of dark secrets, capable of a honed single mindedness, and a survivor of tragic circumstances.
Her internal dialogue is always wonderful—wry, dramatic and revealing.
The Aimée Leduc Companion [Kindle Edition] (also published by Soho) is a great background to the previous novels. I love the maps in it and drag out my Paris maps for greater comparison being a bit of a map junkie. It was free at the time. It may still be.
I adore Cara Black’s Leduc novels and welcome this latest window into the life of Aimée

A Netgalley ARC show less

First Line: Aimée Leduc bit her lip as she scanned the indigo dusk, the shoppers teeming along rain-slicked Boulevard du Montparnasse.

Things just aren't going Aimée Leduc's way. After a meeting with Commissaire Morbier, she learns that she will have to testify in a court case against the Corsican mafia. Her partner René Friant has had a lucrative job offer from Silicon Valley, and he's on a plane to California. Her detective agency has more work than she knows what to do with, and she's hoping that her part-time computer hacker, Saj de Rosnay, will be able to help her out.

But things really start going pear-shaped when she and Saj are involved in an accident in René's beloved car. Now there's a dead man lying in the middle of the show more street and Yuri Volodya, a grumpy old Russian who lives there, insists on hiring Aimée to protect a painting. The only thing that makes her agree to the job is the fact that Volodya says that he knows her mother. By the time Aimée gets to his apartment in Montparnasse, the painting has already been stolen... and the very next day the old Russian is found tortured to death in his kitchen.

Some very dangerous people begin threatening Aimée and her co-workers, witnesses are dying, and all this Parisian private detective has to do is stop the thugs threatening to kill her and her friends, find a painting, and figure out just what her mother-- who's on Interpol's most wanted list-- has to do with all of this. And Aimée thought she was busy before!

By the time I'd read fifty pages of this book, I was hooked. Black has two high-octane plot lines, and I enjoyed them both. The first and most substantial story is Aimée trying to stay alive and find a priceless painting, and the second deals with René and his job in California-- a dream job that he soon learns isn't exactly what it appears to be. I wanted to know what was going on with both characters so badly that I couldn't read fast enough.

As usual, Black sets her story in a Parisian neighborhood, this time Montparnasse, and I loved learning about the Russians who've settled in that area over the course of many years. Reading Aimée Leduc mysteries always puts me in the mood for clothes shopping, ratatouille and a François Truffaut film; Murder Below Montparnasse is no exception.

The only thing that didn't set well with me is that Aimée behaved more like an amateur than a seasoned private investigator. She does have the tendency to act like a bull in a china shop from time to time, but the possible involvement of her mother in this investigation seemed to throw her so off-kilter that she didn't seem to be herself. However, this series gets better and better with each book, and I can't wait to see what sort of trouble Aimée gets into next! show less

I've come late to the Aimee Leduc series, but am glad to tardily make her acquaintance. While I have clearly missed a great deal – almost a dozen earlier mysteries – I never felt as if this was a hindrance to my enjoyment of this mystery. Ensconced in Paris, Ms. Leduc runs the detective agency she inherited from her grandfather and father. Her partner has jetted to California for a dream job, leaving her drowning in work. A mysterious note from a potential client is intriguing, but she hasn’t the time or energy to take it on. A freak accident on her way to return the mysterious client’s money draws her into an intrigue involving Russian oligarchs, Serbian hit men, and a little known Mondrian masterpiece. Atmospheric, well-paced, show more with plenty to keep me going. I intend to read more from Ms. Black in the future. show less

I chose to read "Murder Below Montparnasse" because I know Paris, speak French and like action mystery novels. This book failed to satisfy in all categories. Confession: after forty pages, I just couldn't force myself to read any more.

"Murder Below Montparnasse" is part of a series about private detective Aimée Léduc, an American who lives in Paris and has a detective agency. Perhaps I was disadvantaged by not having read the previous books in the series, although this novel does have snippets of background to let you know the circumstances and setting of the main characters.

Within forty pages, about 12 characters are introduced involving 4 scenes with little or no development. That leaves me cold.

Worse, is the mix of French phrases show more with English prose on virtually every page. It appears that the author is trying to use colloquial French for no reason and with little ability. Dropping French nouns into English sentences just doesn't work. Some of it is grammatically incorrect. Flic, French for "cops," is not just used as plural, "flics."

I guess that "Murder Below Montparnasse" is supposed to be chick lit. For instance, Aimée has just finished helping the police by disguising herself and selling information to a criminal in a sting operation. As she leaves with her partner in his Citroën, she "ran her fingers through her blond-streaked shag cut hair, wishing she hadn't run out of mousse." To me, this sounds inane.

I like Evanovich, Scottoline, Lee Child, Konrath, Sandford and Baldacci, but "Murder Below Montparnasse" didn't engage me. From the reviews, it seems that Cara Black's series has its share of fans who love Aimée. I'm not among them. show less

I didn’t realise until I had finished reading this book that it’s actually number 13 in a long series centred around the main protagonist Aimee Leduc; and now I’ve read this one I will be visiting some of the others in the series to see if they live up to this novel.

I thoroughly enjoyed the way the main protagonist was written; she is intelligent, creative, has a certain effortless French chic and is filled with vitality, oh and did I mention she zips around Paris on a bright pink version of my favourite mode of transport – the Vespa. This character is so well-rounded and developed that it makes it easy for the reader to connect with them and actually enjoy reading about them as they move from one chapter to the next. However, show more she is not perfect and spends this novel blundering from one situation to the next, and has to be the most incompetent Private Detective in fiction. But the incompetence makes her endearing in an odd sort of way, and there are certain personality traits that appear that make the reader wonder if there might be a deeper reasoning for her actions and, sometimes thoughtlessness, in the way she treats those around her. The ‘life’ that the Author has written into their main character is not just served for them however, all the characters are filled with the same love for life and energy that she gives the main; this is one of the reasons anyone picking up this series this far into it, would want to go back and read the earlier books, to gain more knowledge and understanding of the players by reading their backstories. Although this book worked well for me as a standalone novel, I will be reading others from earlier in the series to see if I can gain anymore insight into the characters.

The insiders’ background view to life in Paris is very well detailed in this novel ranging from the busy street cafes, which are a big part of life in this city, to the hidden gems you can often discover as you wander off the beaten track; the surprise gardens, hidden statues and beautifully ornate buildings. Through their descriptions, the Author really brings this city to life and the reader can almost hear the mix of French and other languages coming out of the pages as they read. The plot can be slow at times, but I felt that this was a deliberate move on the part of the Author to fit in with the Parisian, and European, way of life; nothing is rushed and time is taken over everything. The speed the storyline moved made this book, for me, one to be enjoyed at a leisurely pace instead of turning the pages quickly in order to keep up with the action.

I would recommend this book to people who enjoy novels set in France, particularly Paris; lovers of the mystery genre and anyone who is looking for a leisurely but enjoyable read.

Originally reviewed on: http://catesbooknuthut.com/2013/10/24/review-murder-below-montparnasse-aimee-led...



This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. show less

When a series has the longevity of this one, you expect some bumps in the road. It's inevitable you'll prefer some volumes to others. But sometimes, you come across one that makes you wonder if the author may be running out of steam.
This entry in the Aimee Leduc series is more of a chance to catch up with the characters than it is a mystery. It's slow moving with a basic plot but lots of filler detailing the streets & scenery of the beautiful city of Paris.
Aimee is having a bad week. Her former partner, Rene, has left for a supposedly plum job in Silicon Valley & she misses him desperately. Then after helping Commissaire Morbier with a sting, he informs her she'll have to testify in court.
Part time employee Saj picks her up from the show more police station, delivering a letter. It's from a man named Yuri Volodya requesting her assistance & contains two things she can't resist: hints that he knows her long lost mother & money. But when they get to his atelier, it's too late.
Earlier that evening, it was a little crowded at Yuri's home. One thief got interrupted by another but neither got what they came for, a painting by Modigliani. It was already gone. When Saj & Aimee show up, they hit one of the thieves as he tries to crawl away & he dies. And so Yuri & Aimee meet.
Now he wants her to find the painting & over the next few days, Aimee is threatened by Serbs, attacked in her office, Saj ends up in hospital & Yuri is dead. Sounds like a fast paced thriller, right? Surprisingly, not.
This is a very slow read, with more time spent describing the streets of Paris & the labels on Aimee's clothes. The real mystery may be how she survives in the business. She is amazingly inept, frequently stumbling, making poor choices & jumping to conclusions with little evidence. With any book, I don't have to like a character but I do have to believe them. If the main character is not credible, the plot better be intricate & smart. Sadly, there was just not enough here to hold my interest & I found myself skimming.
Just as an aside, I don't understand why the author has liberally sprinkled french phrases throughout the dialogue. I would assume the characters are speaking french & we're reading it in english for our convenience so why the two languages?
As always, it's a matter of taste. If you're a big fan of previous books you'll probably enjoy this more as a chance to catch up with the characters than a mystery as there is some news at the end that will affect subsequent books. show less

I didn’t realise until I had finished reading this book that it’s actually number 13 in a long series centred around the main protagonist Aimee Leduc; and now I’ve read this one I will be visiting some of the others in the series to see if they live up to this novel.

I thoroughly enjoyed the way the main protagonist was written; she is intelligent, creative, has a certain effortless French chic and is filled with vitality, oh and did I mention she zips around Paris on a bright pink version of my favourite mode of transport – the Vespa. This character is so well-rounded and developed that it makes it easy for the reader to connect with them and actually enjoy reading about them as they move from one chapter to the next. However, show more she is not perfect and spends this novel blundering from one situation to the next, and has to be the most incompetent Private Detective in fiction. But the incompetence makes her endearing in an odd sort of way, and there are certain personality traits that appear that make the reader wonder if there might be a deeper reasoning for her actions and, sometimes thoughtlessness, in the way she treats those around her. The ‘life’ that the Author has written into their main character is not just served for them however, all the characters are filled with the same love for life and energy that she gives the main; this is one of the reasons anyone picking up this series this far into it, would want to go back and read the earlier books, to gain more knowledge and understanding of the players by reading their backstories. Although this book worked well for me as a standalone novel, I will be reading others from earlier in the series to see if I can gain anymore insight into the characters.

The insiders’ background view to life in Paris is very well detailed in this novel ranging from the busy street cafes, which are a big part of life in this city, to the hidden gems you can often discover as you wander off the beaten track; the surprise gardens, hidden statues and beautifully ornate buildings. Through their descriptions, the Author really brings this city to life and the reader can almost hear the mix of French and other languages coming out of the pages as they read. The plot can be slow at times, but I felt that this was a deliberate move on the part of the Author to fit in with the Parisian, and European, way of life; nothing is rushed and time is taken over everything. The speed the storyline moved made this book, for me, one to be enjoyed at a leisurely pace instead of turning the pages quickly in order to keep up with the action.

I would recommend this book to people who enjoy novels set in France, particularly Paris; lovers of the mystery genre and anyone who is looking for a leisurely but enjoyable read.

Originally reviewed on: http://catesbooknuthut.com/2013/10/24/review-murder-below-montparnasse-aimee-led...



This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. show less