Reviewed by BERYL EICHENBERGER
Listen to this book review
Memory – it’s a fickle thing. It can be used, abused, warm, comforting, traumatic, repressed, buried or controlled. But what if, suddenly, a flash of memory returns, is a shocking revelation, seemingly forgotten for 80 years, vividly exhibiting the power of recall.
The new novel by Matthew Blake, A Murder in Paris, is a finely paced psychological thriller using memory, psychotherapy and secrets carried through generations, in a chilling and tangled story. Ah, Paris, city of romance, gracious old buildings, history, intrigue, the arts. A wander through the streets can take you back centuries, and Blake teases all these things into his narrative. A famous painting ‘Memory’, hanging in the lobby of the luxurious hotel Lutetia, broken romances, nefarious individuals, powerful friends, all bound together by a long-buried secret and memories.
Paris 1945. The Occupation is over, the elegant Lutetia Hotel is being used to house survivors from Auschwitz. Room 11 is allocated to two young women, emaciated, in rags, heads shaven. Only one young woman leaves; the other is dead. Not unsurprising nor suspicious, considering the circumstances.
2025, and celebrated artist Josephine Benoit, now well into her 90s and suffering the first signs of dementia, arrives at the hotel where her famous painting Memory hangs in the lobby. She is proclaiming that she is really Sophie Leclerc, not Benoit. Making a startling confession about Room 11, she starts a chain reaction that has far-reaching consequences – and murder on the way.
Summoned by Vidal, the seasoned French detective, Josephine’s granddaughter, psychotherapist Dr Olivia Finn races from her home in London. Mystified but central to this investigation, she consults her mentor, Josephine’s old friend and world-renowned psychotherapist Louis de Villefort. But all is not as it should be – layers of lies and manipulation are being peeled back: the walls are closing in but on whom? The past is creeping up to the present; the confession has unleashed mortal danger and the pace quickens. Everyone is connected – is everyone also culpable? Who is benign and who is evil?
Using memory almost as a character, Blake unpacks a story that is complicated, plausible and terrifying in its implication. After reading this, I would be very wary of consulting a psychotherapist! The question is: How in control are we? Can a memory be completely erased, recovered, influenced? Power and control can be exerted in many different ways, and Blake has competently illustrated this.
This is a terrific read as it flits across the characters, scaling the decades, linking the memories, highlighting the vulnerability of the mind. ●
The book is available at all good bookstores and the Gitlin Library.
About the author
Before writing fiction, Matthew Blake worked as a researcher and speechwriter at the Palace of Westminster. He studied English at Durham University and Merton College, Oxford. He is a novelist and screenwriter and his debut psychological thriller, ANNA O, was a global Number One bestseller and published in over 40 territories. It is being developed for the screen by Netflix. A Murder in Paris is his second novel.
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