The Acupulco

 by Simone Buchholz

Good to see Chastity Riley again but this book was not great. A serial killer targeting dancers in a nightclub. As you would expect it raced along but didn't really take me along with it 5/10

Eugenie

 by Desmond Seward

A life of the last empress of France by a not totally unbiased biographer. He clearly is a fan and has a remote family connection back to the second empire.

That aside, I enjoyed this book and it gives a good introduction to the workings of the second empire and the contradictions it contained. She is painted as a formidable woman but with a love for France that was never wholly accepted by its citizens. The book discusses but reaches no clear conclusion on the thing that drove her. Was she swayed more by her desire to see her son as emperor or by her love for France? 8/10

Maigret's Secret

 by Georges Simenon

This story starts brilliantly with a rice pudding being enjoyed by Maigret while dining with his wife at their friend's house. After dinner Maigret starts to reminisce on a previous case which was taken out of his hands by the examining magistrate but about which Maigret always had doubts. A man was accused of killing his wife but he maintains his innocence even as evidence mounts against him. 9/10

The Library Thief

 by Kuchenga Shenje

A mystery set at the turn of the nineteenth century involving a young woman who is an expert book restorer. As we start the novel she has been thrown out of her home by her father for some unseemly goings on with a young anarchist friend of hers and the rest of the story is about how she makes her way,

Full of twists and turns, highlighting the precarious position of a woman alone at this time, it is a real page turner to the end. I found the writing style a bit laboured at times but enjoyed the tale itself. 7/10