A World of Curiosities: A Novel (Chief Inspector Gamache Novel, 18)

by Louise Penny

Hardcover, 2022

Call number

MYST PEN

Collections

Genres

Publication

Minotaur Books (2022), 400 pages

Description

It's spring and Three Pines is reemerging after the harsh winter. But not everything buried should come alive again. Not everything lying dormant should reemerge. But something has. As the villagers prepare for a special celebration, Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir find themselves increasingly worried. A young man and woman have reappeared in the Sûrét du Québec investigators' lives after many years. The two were young children when their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them damaged, shattered. Now they've arrived in the village of Three Pines. But to what end? Gamache and Beauvoir's memories of that tragic case, the one that first brought them together, come rushing back. Did their mother's murder hurt these children beyond repair? Have those terrible wounds, buried for decades, festered, and are they now about to erupt? As Chief Inspector Gamache works to uncover answers, his alarm grows when a letter written by a long dead stonemason is discovered. In it the man describes his terror when bricking up an attic room somewhere in the village. Every word of the 150-year-old letter is filled with dread. When the room is found, the villagers decide to open it up. As the bricks are removed, Gamache, Beauvoir, and the villagers discover a world of curiosities. But the head of homicide soon realizes there's more in that room than meets the eye. There are puzzles within puzzles, and hidden messages warning of mayhem and revenge. In unsealing that room, an old enemy is released into their world. Into their lives. And into the very heart of Armand Gamache's home.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member delphimo
A long awaited arrives and I spent two days enamored with the story. The story begins with the pairing of Gamache and Jean-Guy that happened many years prior due to the new case involving the murder of a young mother. Clotilde Arsenault’s body washes ashore and Gamache must tell her children: a
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13-year-old daughter and a 10-year-old son. As Gamache and Jean-Guy delve deeper into the investigation many horrors surface. Gamache and Jean-Guy must separate fact from fiction. The murderer of Clotilde is arrested and sentenced. The story jumps ahead to a graduation ceremony where Clotilde’s daughter, Fiona, graduates as an engineer. A hidden room in Myrna’s loft uncovers many secrets from the past and a huge montage canvass. Supposedly, the room was sealed closed many centuries ago. This leads Gamache to the worst of his fears with the escape of John Fleming. I adore the Biblical quotations and the poems scattered throughout the book. I so enjoyed the book that I neglected household chores in order to discover the ending.
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LibraryThing member cyderry
This installment of the Third Pines mysteries centers on 2 victims who were "rescued" by Armand Gamache and Jean Guy Beauvoir in their first collaborations told in flashbacks. The victims, Fiona and Sam Arsenault, were the children of a prostitute who forced them into the same life before she was
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killed. How this effects the children and their future carries forward into the present and their connections to the newest danger in Three Pines. I don't want to put out any spoilers, so I will not expand on the tale itself.

Suffice it to say that the tale was expertly crafted - weaving in ordinary events and characters with unusual happenings presenting the reader with a bone chilling terrifying climax. How Ms. Penny continues to enrich our lives with these tremendous stories amazes me, but I will continue to read an apprciate.
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LibraryThing member Judiex
A WORLD OF CURIOSITIES begins with the initial meeting of Chief Inspector Armande Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir; Knowing their current relationship, it shows how actually working together totally changed Jean-Guy’s attitude.
The case began with finding the body of a woman in a car that was partly
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in a lake. The woman was a known drug addict and a prostitute. When Armande went to tell her children, 13-year-old Fiona and 10-year-old Sam, their reactions were very different. The boy cried, the girl did not. The police soon discovered that not only had the woman been responsible for setting up sex appointments, her children had been involved. And there were videos of encounters. The local sheriff was reluctant to become involved. What happens to the children is a major story line as their lives go in different directions.
While someone is convicted of the murder of the woman, there are doubts about who really did it.
A second plot revolves around a hidden room in the 150-year-old building where Myrna and Harriet live. No one knew it was there until a more complete look at the roof revealed it’s existence. The room had been blocked off by a brick wall. When the wall was unsealed, it held many items typically found in an attic. One of them was a copy of a large painting, The Paston Treasures, painted in the early 1670s. Showing more than a hundred items that most people in the area had never seen when it was painted, it was a visual catalogue of objects, including animals, birds, and plants, that the homeowners had seen on their travels. The original was in a museum in England. A close examination reveals that there are important differences between the original and the one in the hidden room. The differences are important clues.
Other subplots include actions against accused witches and the massacre of young women studying to become engineers.
There are references to previous books in the series. One that is not explored is Jean-Guy’s young daughter, Idola. The story implies she has some sort of developmental disability but it is not identified.
A WORLD OF CURIOSITIES skips around in time

TIDBITS: Not for the first time the retired psychologist wondered who’d decided to name that part of the body the temple. No doubt some man who worshipped information. Thinking that the brain was the temple where knowledge was housed.
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LibraryThing member bookworm12
What a ride! A dark start that was hard to read, but led to one of the best mysteries yet. I couldn’t put it down. A hidden room, a complicated painting, and a threat like Three Pines has never faced. All your favorite characters are there, but this one really focuses on Gamache and Beauvoir and
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gives more detail on their first case together. Truly one of the best of the series, but be aware of the dark material at the beginning.
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LibraryThing member Bookish59
Once again, Penny has reminded us that 'appalling people are the exception" when we see and feel ongoing evil around us.

A World of Curiosities shows how the past impacts the present and future. The murder of a woman found in a lake years ago presents Gamache with the egregious circumstances of her
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daughter's and son's lives. Penny weaves their story with strands of an historical Canadian tragedy, and to the bizarre discovery of a closed-off room in Myrna's home filled with oddities.

All lead to a re-awakening of anger, resentment, revenge and evil. Gamache must be hyper-vigilant to stop what has been planned for years and is headed toward Three Pines.

Penny's books are exciting but more importantly they are smart, substantial, literary, artistic, musical, and comforting.
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LibraryThing member bereanna
Amazingly complex whodunnit involving a secret room with a sinister painting, the Three Pines characters and a new Surete agent, Amelia Choquet. I relished this book and read slowly, rereading parts to make certain I knew what I’d read. Mine is a signed copy given for an Louise Penny talk I
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attended with friend in Ogh.
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LibraryThing member N.W.Moors
This is one of those books that I wish I could give more stars to. It's intricately plotted, weaving back and forth in time and place in a thoroughly mystifying and satisfying story.
It starts with the first meeting of Gamache and Jean-Guy at the murder of a woman found on the shore of a lake with
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her head bashed in. Jean-Guy is young and brash, an outcast in his rural department, but Armand sees something in the man and taps him for his squad. They solve that murder, but the consequences reverberate the years to the present in Three Pines.
It's such terrific writing, with all the familiar characters from Three Pines appearing, including Rosa. The story kept me guessing; I kept lighting on one suspect to change to another and then another as evidence mounted. I love the historical details about The Paston Treasure, the founding of Three Pines, and how they add to the mystery. Ms. Penny's writing is impeccable, with a lyrical flow of words that can devolve into much-needed humor in an instant. I love this series, and I think it just keeps getting better and better.
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LibraryThing member VictoriaJZ
I really enjoyed this book, especially the discussions and information about archiving, painting, witches etc. = good to learn about new things to look into.
LibraryThing member Doondeck
One of the best Ganache books ever.
LibraryThing member jepeters333
It’s spring and Three Pines is reemerging after the harsh winter. But not everything buried should come alive again. Not everything lying dormant should reemerge.

But something has.

As the villagers prepare for a special celebration, Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir find themselves increasingly
Show More
worried. A young man and woman have reappeared in the Sûreté du Québec investigators’ lives after many years. The two were young children when their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them damaged, shattered. Now they’ve arrived in the village of Three Pines.

But to what end?

Gamache and Beauvoir’s memories of that tragic case, the one that first brought them together, come rushing back. Did their mother’s murder hurt them beyond repair? Have those terrible wounds, buried for decades, festered and are now about to erupt?

As Chief Inspector Gamache works to uncover answers, his alarm grows when a letter written by a long dead stone mason is discovered. In it the man describes his terror when bricking up an attic room somewhere in the village. Every word of the 160-year-old letter is filled with dread. When the room is found, the villagers decide to open it up.

As the bricks are removed, Gamache, Beauvoir and the villagers discover a world of curiosities. But the head of homicide soon realizes there’s more in that room than meets the eye. There are puzzles within puzzles, and hidden messages warning of mayhem and revenge.

In unsealing that room, an old enemy is released into their world. Into their lives. And into the very heart of Armand Gamache’s home.
Show Less
LibraryThing member clue
Young adult siblings come back into the lives of Gamache and Jean Guy. As children their mother, a prostitute, was murdered. During the investigation Gamache realized the brother and sister had been routinely sexually abused by her customers. He remembers it as one of his worst cases. Although he
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has had a personal relationahip with the young woman, he has never been comfortable with her brother. There is something that causes him to want distance between them.

A second storyline revolves around a secret room found in Myrna's loft after a wall is knocked down. Surprisingly it isn't an empty room, it holds many unexplainable things including a very large painting that has a sinister quality. How long has it been there? Who painted it? What does it mean? Eventully the two storylines merge and all questions are answered.

There are things I don't like about Penny's writing. For instance, though her plots are often called complex, I think they're just cluttered with unnecssary information and disjointed sentences. Still, I started reading the series when the first book was published and here I am, just having finished the 18th.
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LibraryThing member diana.hauser
A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny is the 18th Book in Ms. Penny’s Armand Gamache series. Armand Gamache is Chief Inspector of Homicide for the Surete du Quebec.
This title is a deeply emotional, intense, complex and dark story where Armand is forced to examine his worst fears.
A book rich in
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detail, mystery, suspense, elegance, meditation, poetry and very lyrical writing.
I can think of only one word to describe this book and that word is Brilliant.
*****
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LibraryThing member SABC
In this 18th book of Penny's series, a young man and a young woman reappear in Three Pines. They left several years ago after their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them shattered. What are they up to???
LibraryThing member lauralkeet
Let’s start with what I liked about this book, the eighteenth installment in the Inspector Gamache series. Penny describes the moment when Jean Guy Beauvoir meets Gamache, the early days of what turns out to be a long-term partnership, and their first case working together. The case concerns the
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murder of a woman who leaves behind two young children, Fiona and Sam. Their investigation plays out over several chapters, with Penny periodically bringing us back to the present day where Fiona and Sam, now young adults, enter the picture again. So far so good.

The present-day mystery didn’t work as well for me. It felt like Penny threw everything but the kitchen sink into the plot, from the appearance of an unexpected artifact to a murder with ties to yet another years-old case. This case was so significant in Gamache’s career that it should have been mentioned in earlier books, but I have no memory of it (I’m happy to be corrected on this point). And then Gamache and Beauvoir spent a lot of time waffling, divided over whether either Fiona or Sam were involved in these events. Everything is wrapped up, Poirot-style, with Gamache connecting the dots and solving the crime, but by that point it all felt a bit contrived.

I really enjoy this series for the setting as well as the principal characters who have developed nicely over the years. I will almost certainly read the next one, and just hope the storyline is a bit more believable.
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LibraryThing member Dianekeenoy
These books are so very good, especially on audio! The narrator, Robert Bathurst is excellent! This book starts in the past at a murder scene of a woman who has two young children left at home by themselves. This is also where Inspector Gamache finds the young Jean Guy in the basement of the local
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Surete and brings him into this sordid investigation which comes back to haunt them many years later. This audiobook made my 11 hour trip back home from NC fly by! I didn't go to sleep last night until I finished listening to this book!
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LibraryThing member Cecilturtle
Penny does it again, bringing us into Gamache's dark world of murderers and psychopaths. She does a tremendous job of exploring Gamache's psychology and his failings while at the same time walking us through time and space with Paston's Treasure. Certainly using the painting as a key into multiple
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realities is brilliant. However, I was a little disappointed at how quickly I discovered the murderer and there were details that fit the narrative but were a bit sloppy (can anyone chose what name to travel under these days?). Still, I definitely enjoyed the tale and its originality.
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LibraryThing member jennybeast
This series is always satisfying to me — three pines and it’s residents are a wonderfully comforting foil against the nefarious and often chilling murders that surround Gamache. This one is puzzles within puzzles and a constantly shifting question over who can be trusted. Riveting!
LibraryThing member lbswiener
A World of Curiosities is two stories that mingle together to make one. The book's premise seems to be that friends and family are important and should be acknowledged as that. The character build up is great and so is the setting. We being the reader learns the origin of Three Pines the mythical
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village that is not on the map. The book received four stars in this review and is highly recommended for Chief Inspector Armand Gamache fans.
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LibraryThing member thewanderingjew
A World of Curiosities, (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #18), Louise Penny author; Robert Bathurst, narrator
Is there anyone who would not like to step into the imaginary world of Louise Penny’s Three Pines, at least for one day? It is a place that seems idyllic, even when a crisis occurs. It is a
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place and group of people that accepts all sorts of odd and quirky residents with love and loyalty. Their weather is as diverse as the people, and one can always count on excitement from the lives of those involved with Inspector Armand Gamache.
In this latest book, I was not disappointed. My “friends” were all there, ready to work together as a team to help each other when the mystery developed. The book began with Armand Gamache reminiscing about his life as the town prepared to celebrate the graduation of Fiona, (she and her brother were orphaned when their drug addicted, prostitute mother, Clotilde Arsenault, was murdered), and the award of a scholarship to Myrna’s somewhat introverted and skittish niece, Harriet. The fly in the ointment is that Fiona Arsenault murdered her mother and her brother Sam, who is perceived to be a psychopath by the Inspector, like a famous serial killer in his past. As they become more intertwined in the lives of those in Three Pines, through their connection with Jean-Guy Beauvois and Inspector Armand Gamache, when Sam suddenly comes to Three Pines for Fiona’s graduation, Armand’s radar picks up dangerous vibes. When Harriet takes a shine to Sam, it makes him wonder if she is safe with him. Is he imagining trouble?
As the Montreal Massacre is remembered by Gamache, Armand also recalls the day he met Jean-Guy, an insolent, angry, young man that he brought into the Surete as an investigator, who then married his daughter and became the father of his grandchildren! Agent Beauvois and Inspector Gamache now work very closely together. He instinctively recognizes and accepts those that suffer from loss and hardship because of his own past that was riddled with pain when his parents were killed in an automobile accident by a drunk driver. He has also mentored Amelia Choquet, a loose-lipped, nose-ringed, tattooed young women with pink hair. Armand was only a little boy when his parents died, and he identifies with those who have also suffered loss. He met Jean-Guy as he began the investigation of Clotilde’s murder.
After the festivities of the day’s events, Fiona, now an engineer, mentions that she believes that there is a hidden space, unused, above the bookstore. It seems that Myrna wants to move away to a place with more space for her niece to visit more comfortably, now that she and Bill are living together, and this space, if opened up, might provide a better solution for all those who would miss Myrna and Bill. They discover that a letter was forwarded to Bill, supposedly sent to him, that described a stonemason’s experience with building that wall, the wall that hid a supposed secret room. When they break through the wall, they discover a copy of a very famous, and very large painting by an unknown artist, called The Paston Treasure. The painting represents artifacts that existed in a cabinet in the mid 1600’s, but in this copy, overlaid and dispersed throughout, there are items of the current day, like an airplane and a digital watch. Who painted this one? Why was it walled up in this hidden room? How did it even get into the room? As the number of clues grow with each person’s connection to the painted overlays, the mystery and the danger coming, grows more apparent to Gamache. He begins to wonder about a serial killer he captured and put away for life. When he finds out that this killer is not in prison, but someone impersonating him is, he knows that there is something really sinister occurring and he begins to investigate further. He learns that art therapy is used in prisons to reform prisoners. Does it work? The twists and turns and odd connections of people become better known to him, and his fear grows.
The book refers to a real painting and a very real massacre that occurred at the Polytechnique Institute. Otherwise, the story is fiction. The characters and themes are very creatively knitted together. What at first seems to be separate ingredients like those in a cake before they are mixed together, becomes a perfectly baked cake in the end, when all of the questions that are raised during the investigations are answered.
The book is read superbly by the narrator who uses just the right amount of stress and tone for each character, but the inclusion of “woke”, progressive issues, for no real reason that was apparent to me. It was disappointing that someone with such a successful series of novels would succumb to include such unnecessary information, seemingly just to fit in with the current mob of progressives, and it was distracting.
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LibraryThing member juju2cat
White it was nice revisiting with the Three Pines characters I could not see the fascination with the painting "A World of Curiosities". It was a good novel and held my interest though.
LibraryThing member capewood
2023 book #9: 2022. 2 gruesome cases from the past come together unexpectedly to threaten Inspector Gamache, his family and his colleges. A little improbable perhaps, and certainly complicated, but a good read. 18th in the series.
LibraryThing member JorgeousJotts
This had several things that were quite a stretch, but it was enjoyable enough that I could mostly just note them and continue on. As with the entire series though, the characters are what made it. It's been nice to better understand all the personalities and relationships in each book.
LibraryThing member ccayne
I am a fan of this series and usually listen. Penny usually weaves in a topical angle which was missing here. The plot required more suspension of belief and ended rather tidily, all things considered. For these reasons, it was a bit disappointing.
LibraryThing member carolfoisset
This one way a page turner - enjoyed it much more than her last one.
I am finding some of the repetitive behaviors and dialogue between some characters getting old. I realize not every reader has read all of the books and I guess Penny is attempting to flesh out the characters somewhat in each
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book, however, since I have read them all I do not enjoy the repetition.
I do appreciate how Penny brings art, poetry, nature, and good food into her books. In this book, the painting, The Paston Treasure is an actual piece of art and it was fun to learn a bit more about it. Reading Penny's acknowledgments I was shocked to find out that the murders at Ecole Polytechnique were also factual. After this event Canada brought about much stricter gun legislation, how I wish the US would have followed suit after one of our many, many mass shootings.
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LibraryThing member fromthecomfychair
One of her best.

Awards

Audie Award (Finalist — Mystery — 2024)
Anthony Award (Nominee — Novel — 2023)
Macavity Award (Nominee — 2023)
Agatha Award (Nominee — Contemporary Novel — 2022)
Lefty Award (Nominee — 2023)

Pages

400

ISBN

1250145295 / 9781250145291

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