Review: "The Body in the Castle Well," Martin Walker

By Paul Carrier

 

I would never suggest that Martin Walker has developed a cookie-cutter formula for his enticing crime novels, which are set in the countryside of France. But the books in the series share several elements that provide continuity.

For one thing, the setting — the Périgord region  — remains unchanged from one tale to the next. Mouth-watering culinary delights are guaranteed as each plot unfolds. Regular characters pop up time after time. Revealing glimpses of French culture and history are a staple of the series. Bruno Courrèges, ostensibly nothing more than a small-town cop in rural St. Denis, is sure to play a central role in solving whatever dastardly deed occurs in his village or its environs. And without fail, Bruno is assisted, or at least watched over, by a pet basset hound.

In Body in the Castle Well, the 12th book in the series, Claudia Muller, a wealthy American studying with a renowned but possibly dishonest art historian and collector, is found dead. What first appears to be an accident turns out to be anything but.

Over the course of some 300+ pages, Body in the Castle Well covers a lot of territory as the investigation unfolds, touching on falconry, the Renaissance, French resistance and Nazi collaboration during World War Two, Algeria’s struggle for independence, and the local ties of Josephine Baker, the American-born French entertainer and Allied spy.