A Trick of the Light: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel [Paperback]

ANew York TimesNotable Crime Book and Favorite Cozy for 2011
APublishers WeeklyBest Mystery/Thriller books for 2011

Penny has been compared to Agatha Christie [but] it sells her short. Her characters are too rich, her grasp of nuance and human psychology too firm.... --Booklist(starred review)

Hearts are broken, Lillian Dyson carefully underlined in a book. Sweet relationships are dead.
But now Lillian herself is dead. Found among the bleeding hearts and lilacs of Clara Morrow's garden in Three Pines, shattering the celebrations of Clara's solo show at the famed Mus?e in Montreal. Chief Inspector Gamache, the head of homicide at the S?ret? du Qu?bec, is called to the tiny Quebec village and there he finds the art world gathered, and with it a world of shading and nuance, a world of shadow and light. Where nothing is as it seems. Behind every smile there lurks a sneer. Inside every sweet relationship there hides a broken heart. And even when facts are slowly exposed, it is no longer clear to Gamache and his team if what they've found is the truth, or simply a trick of the light.

Questions for Discussion

1. Clara is simultaneously elated and terrified by the long-awaited celebration of her art, while other artists throughout the novel struggle with varying degrees of success and recognition. How do you see both the rewards and the hardships of life as an artist?

2. I was much too far out all my life/And not waving but drowning. How do Stevie Smith's lines apply to various characters in the story? Who seems to be drowning? Do you think they can be saved?

3. There are many old friendships in this bookfrom Lillian and Clara, to Gamache and Beauvoir, to the relationships among people in Three Pines. How do these friendships helpor in some cases hurtthe people involved? What do you make of Clara's trip to see Lillian's parents?