“Thank you for your service”
five words for a lifetime ~
Each year I think of my
uncles, friends and family
who joined military ranks ~ all returned with limbs intact,
but what of minds and hearts?
What of those lives lost?
The only words I do have are:
“Thank you for your service”
“Our country honours those who have served, both past and present,
in times of war, military conflict and peace.”
~ Lawrence MacAulay,
former Minister of Veterans Affairs and
Associate Minister of National Defence
Some readers loved, some disliked The Kingdom of the Blind. Those that liked it were in the majority. I finished reading this mystery two weeks ago, so needed to review some reviews. Set in Three Pines, Québec in winter, the very snowscape enhances the mystery. A farmhouse is where Gamache, Myrna and Benedict meet the lawyer Monsieur Mercier. That farmhouse eventually falls down.
In the main, I enjoyed this fourth novel, but not in order of publication dates. Each work stands on its own. Three Pines, the tiny village where Armand Gamache lives with his wife, Reine-Marie and their two dogs is a safe haven, but murder seems to follow him there! This time the murder took place in that falling down farmhouse, some distance from Three Pines. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Armand and his neighbour Myrna Landers had each received letters notifying them that they were Liquidators of the will of Bertha Baumgartner. (Liquidators of wills in Québec are the equivalent of a Power of Attorney in the rest of Canada.) Neither of them know this woman but will learn of her convoluted and possibly delusion family history. A third man has also been sent the same letter: Benedict Pouliot, according to his business card is a Builder. He doesn’t know this woman either. Their first task is to contact the lawyer Laurence Mercier to begin sorting out this first mystery. Mrs. Baumgartner, known to all as Baroness, is in fact a cleaning lady. But a cleaning lady whose title and family inheritance goes back over 150 years to Europe. Money, legalities and big business are knotted together.
A second mystery, leading from Glass Houses published in 2017, is still unwinding. Gamache has been suspended from the Suréte because of his decisions related to a large shipment of carfentanyl. Most of it had been apprehended, but a large portion had been diverted into Montréal. One of his young agents, Amelia Choquet had apparently gone rogue and had to be ejected from the Academy for possession of drugs. Previously actively addicted, she returned to the streets of Montréal and began a search for the loose carfentanyl. This did not help his position. In the meantime, Jean-Guy Beauvoir, Gamaches’ second in command and his son-in-law, had been elevated into the role of Acting Head of Homicide. Beauvoir is stuck between his superiors and his wife and children and his father-in-law while juggling these two cases.
Louise Penny artfully keeps this story line, while bringing the residents of Three Pines along with Gamache. The Bistro is the meeting place for much conversation and good food. Mysteries solved amid laughter and camaraderie. A place of ease for both the resident and the reader.
“The mess in the drawers was in contrast to the neat desktop.
Many people’s lives were like that. The neat room and
the messy closet, the well-ordered counters
and the chaos in the cabinets.”
~ Louise Penny, Kingdom of the Blind
Title: The Kingdom of the Blind
Author: Louise Penny
Copyright: 2018
Publisher: by Three Pines Creations
Type: Novel
Format: Mystery Fiction
ISBN - 978125002206 (hard cover)
ISBN - 9781250313522 (international, sold outside the U.S., subject to rights availability)
ISBN - 9781466873698 (ebook)
LCCN - 2010227731
I’ve spent the day watching cooking shows.
Thinking...Pork ribs...a dry rub...
Spices and brown sugar
from cupboard & spice rack
Slow cooked for four hours
Brushed with my bbq sauce
Under the broiler to finish
One small meal with more for the freezer.
Humbled, grateful and comfortable.
“If more of us valued food and cheer and song
above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”
~ J.R.R.Tolkien
“Em, I’m so sorry.” Jeremy and Emelina had gone out to supper in Hartley. It was their favourite restaurant. “Their” corner was dark and quiet. Whenever they had needed time together and away from their worlds, they went there. It was a habit developed some time before they were married. They hadn’t planned it, but it was neutral ground for hashing out sensitive questions. Like the most recent. Jeremy’s unsavoury behaviour over Emelina’s plans. Emelina’s walking out on him and letting him stew. They both knew how things could have been done differently, but had only talked to others, never to each other. A good thing. Emelina talking to Dez and Jeremy to Matt, had been a start for each of them. They greeted each other like they were on a first tentative date. Jeremy took her coat and gave it to the coat check attendant. They followed the maitré de in silence. Seated in their private corner, they looked intently at their menus. Jeremy closed his and reached for Em’s hand. “Em, I’m so sorry. This has all been my fault. I didn’t want to hear you out. I wanted you to give me all your attention. If you were to get more involved with the workings of the farming part of the Estate, you wouldn’t have time for me. My time away from work is so limited and I am so tired.” He stopped for a breath. Emelina had put her menu down, letting him talk. “Thank you, Jeremy.” She didn’t know what else to say. The waiter arrived to take their orders. She sensed the same tension that she saw at many tables, especially these private corners. “Do you need a few more minutes?” Looking up at her, Emelina smiled. “Yes, thank you.” Alone again, eyes twinkling, face serious she said “You should be sorry.” Then she laughed. “I just can’t stay mad at you. There’s no point Jeremy. I love you, just don’t be that mean ever again ~ you know how fragile I am.” They both laughed, the tension dissolved. They held hands and locked eyes. “You hungry, Em?”
“Yes, I haven’t eaten for hours.”
“Let’s order so we can get home.”
~~~~~
“Elizabeth, come to the cottage for supper tonight. You’re always feeding everyone else, I’d like to feed you for once. James has been out of town at a business conference for the Association he belongs to. It’s pretty quiet over there and I’d like your company for supper.” Cook wasn’t surprised. Martha had been distracted all day, missing James. She couldn’t have her daughter and grandchildren over; some school function had them occupied. “Sounds good, Martha, dear. I won’t have to cook, or wash dishes. We can gossip to our hearts content. Miss Em and Dr. Jeremy seeing each other again; Miss Dez and Mr. Matt off on some road trip; who knows what else we’ll get up to.”
“Well, we could play cards. We haven’t done that for a long time. There was a time when the two of us would get all dressed up and go out on the town.”
“You go ahead and get supper started. Let me tidy up here and I’ll be right over. I’m bringing dessert. I made peach pies today and one of them seems to be just for us.” Elizabeth texted Samuel. “Going to Elizabeth’s for supper tonight so won’t be home for the evening. Come for breakfast in the morning.” She finished tidying the kitchen and, as was her habit, set out what she would need for the morning. She glanced up the stairs. Miss Em seldom informed her about comings or goings, but she didn’t expect her home tonight, so she made sure all the doors were locked and the lights out.
“They spoke of small things at first, since it was best,
when reattaching threads, to begin with the easiest knots.”
~ Chris Cleave, Everyone Brave is Forgiven
"Wherever you go, no matter what the weather, always
bring your own sunshine."
~ Anthony J. D'Angelo
Sorting through
a jumble of
what should be
what must be
what outcome I want
when should I breathe!
~~~~
The joyful clammer of children
makes it all worthwhile!
~~~~
and with the dishwashers hum
I relaxed.
“It is not enough to be busy; so are the ants.
The question is: What are we busy about?”
~ Henry David Thoreau
Amazed that melodies are never the same, Paul shook his head. His prof had told them: ‘They may have similarities but, they are like fingerprints or snowflakes. No two are the same. The notes, the tone, and the pacing’. He knew that intellectually from listening to his own CD collection, but didn’t know the depth. The music history class had delved into the music of the ages ~ Beethoven, Chopin, Strauss ~ and much farther back in time. None of the pieces were the same. There were always new, fresh musical ideas. All of it first heard in the silence of a composer’s mind. Keys plunked on a piano, strummed on a guitar, blown free on a wind instrument, the notes became a melody, a song or a symphony. Or, just a ditty to whistle absentmindedly. Paul sat at his piano played a new tune.
“Music expresses that which cannot be put into
words and that which cannot remain silent.”
~ Victor Hugo
