Death in the Truffle Wood by Pierre Magnan
My housemate picked up this book in a close-out bookstore. She said it looked interesting, and more importantly, it looked to be a cozy mystery, which are hard to come by here in Australia. I prefer my mysteries, and actually all my leisure reading, on the lighter, less graphic side. I find the section that in American bookstores would be called Mysteries, is generally called Crime here. And the difference is more than in just the word on the heading label. I find light fluffy mysteries with puns in the titles are not really easily found in the bookstores here. It makes it difficult for readers like me who prefer lighter mysteries. Though it is sometimes much easier to find cozy mysteries in close-out bookstores or remainder bins at the mass-market, big-box stores. But this book looked from the cover and description like a book we would enjoy. And as one of a set of 6 for $50 books, she thought it was worth a try.
The quoted review on the cover declared Death in the Truffle Wood was a “quirky” mystery. That was not wrong. It was definitely quirky, both in the characters and the style of writing. I am sure most of that was the author’s own tone and style of writing. But some of the quirkiness may have come with the translation from French to English. Nuances of language can get lost in translation, and sometimes the resulting meaning is a bit different than the original words would have indicated. It’s a known problem with translated works. And while most such translated books I have read were very well done, this one may not have been as well translated, or the translator may have imposed his own style on the work.
The book opened with one set of characters, then jumped to a completely different set in another location for the second chapter. The third and fourth chapters introduced new characters and different locations again. It was well into the book before the characters and settings started to come together and make some sort of sense. I prefer a much more logical progression style of story telling, where the action takes place in a logical, continual manner. I do not like to be switching quickly between unconnected characters and settings, and having new characters brought in independently of established ones. It makes the flow of the book quite choppy and, in my opinion, does not encourage long, lingering stretches of time with the book. Choppy chapters are more suited to quick visits rather than long stays. A book with choppy style will always take longer for me to read than a book with a natural progression style. In reading this book, I felt as though I was dragging myself through the book rather than being pulled along by the story.
I did not come to like the characters very much, they did not become friends and in the end I really did not have a great connection to many of them. In fact, most of them, in my opinion were not nice people; certainly not the kind of people I would want as friends. The only characters I did develop a connection with were the animals: Roseline, the truffle hunting pig and Mambo the dachshund. It was that latter character that really led me to finish the book. He was abandoned in the opening chapter of the book as he master was murdered, and it was the final chapter before he was rescued and re-homed. That was very disturbing to me, and the character’s indifference to the dog was seriously distressing. I had to get to the end of the book to ensure the dog was rescued.
Overall, the book was enjoyable, but only just. I have no desire to have further adventures with the characters, and no real need to seek out anything else by the author.
One Bear’s Opinion: One glass of disappointingly dry red wine with some slightly stale crackers and the rind-y bits of a wheel of brie
Happy Reading Everyone,
Oliver
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