It is one of the finest auberges (inns) in Quebec, a place to rest, unwind, and quietly enjoy each other’s company. While Chief Inspector Armand Gamache saved lives and sanity and a family, this author saved my sanity Other characters in the story include Madame Clementine Dubois - owner of the Manoir Bellechasse; maître d' Pierre Patenaude - a long-time employee who runs an impeccable dining room and trains the wait staff; Elliot Byrne, a new waiter who's insolent to Pierre and makes fun of the guests behind their backs; Colleen, a young gardener; Yves Pelletier - the sculptor who created the statue of Charles Morrow; and several residents of Three Pines, including the innkeeper Gabri and the disgruntled poet Ruth and her duck Rosa.

Manoir Bellechasse dessert: "For Madame we have fresh mint ice cream on an eclair filled with creamy dark chocolate, and for Monsieur a pudding du chomeur a l'erable avec creme chantilly. A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. Peter and Clara Morrow show up at the Manoir to be at a special family reunion of Peter's horrid family. In a heart-stopping climax, Gamache, the murderer, and Bean are at the top of the steep copper roof of the Manoir. I don’t think of Peter as an evil person at all – just a twisted boy who can’t find his self-worth without taking something away from someone else.There is nothing so mundane as a shooting or stabbing for Chief Inspector Gamache to solve, and while it seems impossible for the death to have been murder, it is also equally impossible for it to have been accidental. Their stay coincides with another event, the Finney-Morrow family reunion, for which the family has taken the rest of the rooms in the lodge. It was impossible at the time to flout it too much when pitching, as a publicist never wants to point too much to a single motive when pitching mysteries.

With this group log suspects, Beauvoir may need to pull out all the stops, just to make sense of things. Given that, I wonder if Ms Penny would welcome the opportunity in future editions of her novel to rephrase a comment that Agent Lacoste made in reference to the disparaging washroom graffiti penned by one of the male members of the Finney family, “But that’s thirty-five years ago. Also the contrast and comparison of cultures and languages is addressed in this book as it is in the others. He withheld money and gifts because he realized those things were empty and meaningless; that he’d already given his family what really mattered: love and encouragement.

Louise Penny plays with duality, and in A Rule Against Murder we see the juxtaposition of the unnatural within the natural. I like Clara a little less now; I like Peter almost not at all; and the Gamaches are aces in my book, though I suspect that Armand would wear on me if he's really like he was at the very, very end of this book. I know that misleading the reader and red herrings are typical of murder mysteries, but there’s something about how clumsily—and blatantly—Penny does this that irritates me. The Gamaches talk breezily with Peter and Clara, and share some embarrassing news about the first time Armand met Reine-Marie’s family.

As irritating and bizarre as their bromance is, I find Penny’s worshipful adoration of Gamache even more distracting. They are a mix of self-absorbed, selfish, peculiar characters, who treat everyone, including each other with disdain. Sadly, Dr Michael Whitehead died a couple of years ago, and you might appreciate reading this about him. When I read the book the first time and now rereading it, Pierre as the murderer gave me the uneasy feeling that Penny changed the outcome of the book from her original plan.Gamache and Beauvior spend a good bit of time puzzling over why Julia had her arms outstretched, as if she were hugging the statue to her. There's a big storm and, afterward, the gardener finds the girl squished under the knocked-over statue? Bert Finney is trying to show his support to his wife, but the gestures are swallowed up and unseen by a grieving mother. It does not take place in the beloved Three Pines, true, but Louise begins a journey here that explores Quebec and its history a bit deeper.

In the Bible when it is said that the sins of the father are visited upon the children I believe it is in this manner it is meant.

While it ends with sorrow and sadness, the final item is revealed when the Pandora's box is opened at last. Even with Bert Finney, we learn that he didn’t marry Irene for her vast fortune, but simply because he loved her his entire life.