By Ande Jacobson

Still Life is Louise Penny’s first Chief Inspector Gamache story from 2005. Armand Gamache is a Chief Inspector from the Sûreté du Québec in Montreal who gets called to investigate a suspicious death in a small village not too far away. This is both Penny’s first novel and the first book in her long series of beloved detective stories. While the mystery in this story unfolds in the fictional village of Three Pines, it has been hypothesized that the location is based on Penny’s hometown of Knowlton in Southern Québec. Still Life was first written in English and has since been translated into multiple languages. In the English version, Penny sprinkles bits of French into the description and the dialog on occasion given where the story takes place. Fortunately, a knowledge of French isn’t necessary to fully enjoy the book.

Penny draws vivid characters who delight readers with their quaint observations and local quirks and customs. Her stories are thought of as gentler crime novels with very little violence and no sex which makes them far different from most of the aggressive stories that are so pervasive these days. These stories are instead built through character studies and relationships as Penny focuses on the human and humane interactions. Continue reading →