Status
Series
Description
In Jean-Claude Izzo's "Mediterranean noir" mysteries, the city of Marseilles is explosive, breathtakingly beautiful, and deadly. This first book in the Marseilles trilogy introduces readers to Fabio Montale, a disenchanted cop who turns his back on a police force marred by corruption and racism and, in the name of friendship, takes the fight against the mafia into his own hands. Ugo, Manu, and Fabio grew up together on the mean streets of Marseilles where friendship means everything. They promised to stay true to one another and swore that nothing would break their bond. But people and circumstances change. Ugo and Manu have been drawn into the criminal underworld of Europe's toughest, most violent and vibrant city. When Manu is murdered and Ugo returns from abroad to avenge his friend's death, only to be killed himself, it is left to the third in this trio, Detective Fabio Montale, to ensure justice is done. Despite warnings from both his colleagues in law enforcement and his acquaintances in the underworld, Montale cannot forget the promise he once made Manu and Ugo. He's going to find theirkiller no matter the consequences. Fabio Montale is the perfect protagonist in for a fabled city of melancholy beauty.… (more)
User reviews
It's a bit of a surprise, then, when at the end of the prologue, Ugo is gunned down by the police. The narrative then switches to follow Fabio Montale, police inspector, who grew up in the working-class areas of Marseilles - he too is a childhood friend of Ugo's - and is regarded with suspicion by his colleagues because of a tendency to try and solve problems by talking to the troubled youth of the area rather than going in and breaking heads. Montale is troubled by Ugo's return. How had he found out so quickly who was responsible for Manu's death? Why were the police in exactly the right place to shoot Ugo? And how does this fit in with another crime which affects a friend of Montale's?
This was a very good noir. Even the chapter titles give a good idea of the mood: "In which, even if you're going to lose, you've still go to know how to fight", "In which dawns are nothing but an illusory impression of how beautiful the world is", "In which the way others look at you is a deadly weapon". Montale fits all the noir tropes (washed-up, despairing at the grimness of the world) but does not feel like a cliché. If anything, it's more depressing than a normal noir - because Montale is disillusioned more than anything else by the growing racism that he sees around him, France's intolerant approach to immigrants, and that's a trend I find genuinely depressing in my own country. But it was still very enjoyable to read.
My only criticism relates to one aspect of the translation. Many of the characters speak non-standard French, and this has been rendered in a sort of mixture of northern and cockney, which is quite jarring - particularly as the same mix is used for all the characters, whatever their social or ethnic background. I know slang is hard to translate effectively - whatever you choose will alienate some readers - but this really didn't work for me.
In this first book, Montale's two closest childhood friends, now small-time crooks, have both been killed within the space of a couple of months. According to the official reports, they've been caught up in a settling of accounts between rival gangs, but Montale suspects that there's more to it than that. We soon realise that the role of Montale's own colleagues in the whole affair is far from straightforward, and there seem to be links to right-wing terrorist organisations and the Neapolitan Mafia as well.
As a crime story, there are some technical weaknesses: too many awkward characters are arbitrarily killed off in the later chapters, and the necessary coincidences of the plot are slightly too visible as coincidences. But the colourful language, the Marseilles atmosphere, and Fabio's ironic and wonderfully negative reflections on life and on how a modern city works more than make up for this. Very noir, very neo (even though it's set way back in the era of the Minitel!).
For me, this one reads like a grittier, more brutal, Noir-styled version of Andrea Camilleri’s Inspector Montalbano stories (if that comparison helps). There is a sentimentality to Izzo’s portrayal of Marseilles (similar to Camilleri’s portrayal of fictional small town Sicily), with a focus on the underclass communities of the housing projects and the seedier neighbourhoods. Izzo’s writing style is perfect for a hardboiled detective story: sparse on words, long on atmosphere. While the criminals became a bit of a jumbled mess in my mind – and I found parts of the ending to be a little too contrived – overall, a solid hardboiled detective story and I am looking forward to reading the other two books in the trilogy.
While this is technically crime fiction, I think this is also literature. The depth of feeling that Izzo can generate equals anything found in the best literary fiction. On the back of the book, there is a quote from the Le Monde review saying we are "bound to cry sooner or later." It is truly amazing how many times Izzo took me do the very edge or what I can take. My heart was breaking for Montale. I found myself having strong feelings for even the minor characters. This is part of Izzo's genius. He can paint vibrant pictures with very few words. His sentence structures are so simple and yet portray such complexity.
The story itself is so dark and so many people we care about are hurt. But we are given just enough positives to make it all worthwhile. Montale is someone we can't help but to invest in. Even though he is beat up so many times, you have to keep rooting for him.
While I am a Francophile, and so predisposed to like this kind of thing, I would recommend this to anyone interested in crime fiction or European literature in general. Yes this is crime fiction, but it I would prefer to think of it as literary fiction in which crime is used to create an environment to more fully reveal the complexity of the characters and society present.
I found some of Fabio's observations quite cheesey at times and his dialogue seemed a caricature of tough guy speak. But, the novel was fast paced and interesting because of the details about Marseilles.
You thought southern France might be the place to get away from all the evil, all the early 21st century mess: Marseilles has history, it has cuisine, it has sun, it has the Mediterranean.
Kiss that thought goodbye. Izzo
So read this book and cry.
Then read the next two in the trilogy. Because Izzo can write and a shitty world makes for good mystery writing.
I so wanted to enjoy it.
Frankie Malabe is a cop in Marseilles his 2 old friends from his younger days are dead.
Malabe wants to figure out what happened to them.
This book is good at describing Marseilles but there are to many characters and its confusing.
I finished it
I felt the author was trying too hard. It seemed as though he wanted to check off (multiple times) every cliche of the genre. Characters, plot, sexual encounters, locales, gourmet recipes, inner psychological turmoil. All just seemed glued together to create a "savy" detective novel. Didn't work for me. Just didn't seem natural; more like a bunch of tired cliches glued together.
Some reviewer's comparisons to Raymond Chandler are clearly undeserved.