STICK TOGETHER

Forced to buy into an unwanted case for a logical but
excruciatingly painful reason, Commissaire Anne Capestan drags her squad of
Île-de-France rejects (The Awkward Squad, 2017) along for the ride.

Who should investigate the fatal shooting of retired Commissaire
Serge Rufus, of the Brigade Antigang? The obvious candidate is the members of
Paris’ Brigade Criminelle. But Capestan’s boss, Directeur Buron, wants her
squad of officers, exiled from their original posts because of misbehavior or
incompetence, to join—though not lead, he carefully adds—the investigation,
because she was until recently married to the victim’s son,
comedian-turned–club owner Paul Rufus. Capestan hasn’t even wanted to see Paul.
Now she has to comfort him, question him, and protect him from what promises to
be a considerable buffeting after his father’s death turns out to be only part
of a larger pattern. Provencal furniture manufacturer Jacques Maire has already
been murdered in a way that clearly connects his death to Serge’s, and a third
murder will confirm the pattern. A ray of hope shines when the squad’s deep
data dig links all three homicides to a 25-year-old armed robbery that left two
dead at the Minerva Bank in Lyon, especially since convicted robber Max Ramier
has just been released from prison after serving his time. But Ramier first
humiliates Capestan by eluding the dragnet she’s spread around him and then has
the impudence to get murdered himself, leaving the squad back at square
one—unless they care to cast a cold eye at Capitaine Orsini, one of their own
number whom the evidence uncomfortably implicates in the Minerva Bank job.

Best enjoyed by readers who’ll happily accept a low surprise
quotient in return for needle-sharp portraits of professional infighting among
France’s finest.