Review: Louise Penny's ALL THE DEVILS ARE HERE

 

In this 2020 novel Louise Penny dives once again into deep state conspiracies.  Lurking behind and under the idyllic Three Pines with its gourmet pub and quirky characters always seems to lie a fetid swamp containing vicious public or private power mongers who will stop at nothing to obtain and keep their control.  In this outing Armand Gamache deserts the hamlet of Three Pines and travels to Paris to be with his daughter and son in law for the birth of their second child.  While there Gamache’s godfather is seriously injured in a hit and run accident that Gamache feels is no accident at all.  Needless to say from there on the darkness goes deep and the City of Light is fraught with plots from the tip of the Eiffel Tower to the sub-basement of a preeminent historic library. 

The twists and action come a mile a minute, as long as you accept the massive coincidences that set up the story. As in a number of her more recent works, the setup does push the “willing suspension of disbelief” to its limits. Would  Gamache’s Godfather, although a complicated pursuer of wealth and power himself, engage in actions that would knowingly  put his godson, his godson’s wife, their children, and their grandchildren in physical jeopardy?  I think not.  It is also hard to accept in these days that anyone could peddle a billion dollars of old master paintings in order to fund a plan without ringing alarm bells somewhere in the vast inter-connected international art scene.

That said, I also have to admit that the lack of credulity in the setup is forgotten about a third of the way through. After that you are caught up in the search and the monstrous horror of the developing conspiracy. Penny’s recurring theme of powerful people going wrong in their search for more money and more power takes over.  The fact that the suspects are often people that Gamache knows well puts him in the difficult position of deciding whether they are part of the solution or at the center of the problem itself.

Ms. Penny plainly shows her love for Paris on her sleeve. She has done her site research thoroughly and captures the sights, the sounds, and the food of the city with expertise and love.  I have visited the city twice over the years and  had no problem following the action and in believing what the title hints at.  Is it possible that “Hell is empty and all the devils are here?” 

Don’t neglect reading the acknowledgements at the end because they do add considerably to the creation of the novel and to Penny’s own life journey.