By Ande Jacobson

The Beautiful Mystery is the eighth full-length mystery novel in Louise Penny’s Chief Inspector Armand Gamache (of the Sûreté du Québec) series, and was first released in 2012. This book is different than most of those before it in the series in that the story doesn’t take place in Three Pines. Evidently the murder capital of Québec took a break, and Armand and his second in command, Jean-Guy Beauvoir, head to the wilderness to a remote monastery forgotten by the church and by society until recently. The Gilbertine order, named for Gilbert of Sempringham, was thought to be extinguished or disbanded during the Inquisition, but instead they merely fled Europe for a remote part of Canada where they built the last remaining monastery to continue their brotherhood. The monastery, named Saint-Gilbert-Entre-Les-Loups, garners Armand’s attention when a monk is found dead, presumably murdered, in the abbot’s garden one morning after Lauds. So begins the adventure. Continue reading →