A corpse that wakes up on the mortuary slab.
A case of spontaneous human combustion.
There is little by the way of violent crime and petty theft that Capitaine Victor Coste has not encountered in his fifteen years on the St Denis patch – but nothing like this.
Though each crime has a logical explanation, something unusual is afoot all the same, and Coste is about to be dragged out of his comfort zone. Anonymous letters addressed to him personally have begun to arrive, highlighting the fates of two women, invisible victims whose deaths were never explained. Just two more blurred faces among the ranks of the lost and the damned.
Olivier Norek’s first novel draws on all his experience as a police officer in one of France’s toughest suburbs – the same experience he drew on as a writer for the hit TV series Spiral.
Translated from the French by Nick Caistor.
Anyone who has watched Spiral will appreciate this novel, with its similar tone and deeply rooted realities – The Lost And The Damned is a vivid, often brutal narrative that is highly addictive with some impressive scene setting and intriguing characters.
The story twists and turns beautifully, the writing is classically immersive and you are never quite sure what will happen next. From the moment I read the scene in the mortuary (you’ll see) I knew that this was not a story that would follow the path of least resistance.
Kudos to the translator, Nick Caistor, for ensuring the flow is never jarring or lost, whilst I won’t give away how this story pans out I will say that I can highly recommend it- although perhaps not for the faint of heart.
Excellent.
You can purchase The Lost And The Damned (Maclehose) Here.
Happy Reading!
