Cellars of the majestic - inspector maigret #21

by Georges Simenon

Paper Book, 2015

Status

Available

Call number

843.912

Series

Maigret (20)

Genres

Mystery

All Topics

Fiction

Publication

Penguin Books Ltd, 2015

Description

In the luxury Hotel Majestic, the French wife of a wealthy American businessman is discovered, murdered, in a locker in the hotel's dank basement. The story touches on the illusions of class, the fragility of respectability, and the dark secrets that can unite the most unlikely people.

User reviews

LibraryThing member JoePhelan

Great fun. So glad to know there are so many more Maigret books to read.

3 more

LibraryThing member simchaboston

Light and fun. It did take me a little while to stop longing for a crime procedural, where you actually get to see and hear more of the actual investigating, instead of the information just being presented. (Case in point: the lengthy speech one woman delivers with barely any prompting by Maiget.)

Once I got over that, though, I could enjoy the mystery more, and it was good for my French as well.

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LibraryThing member BooksForDinner

As always, a solid entry. I would love to know if there was ever an explanation on why in one novel Maigret is retired in the country, and the next he is back in Paris. I am reading them in the order they were re-released by Penguin, but hopefully the next one is the one originally written after

Simenon decided to bring Maigret back, a la Doyle and Holmes.

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LibraryThing member thorold

A nice, undemanding novel-length Maigret from the late thirties/early forties (No.41 in the usual lists), with a below-stairs setting in a big Parisian luxury hotel. Fun to see that the arrangements in the hotel basement in those days still include a dining-room reserved for the personal valets and

maids of guests staying in the hotel! A guest's body is discovered in a locker in the staff changing-room, and the obvious suspect is Prosper Donge, the man in charge of the hotel's coffee and tea service. The Examining Magistrate arrests him and assumes the case is closed, but Maigret isn't so sure...

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