The Voice of Aliette Nouvelle: Aliette Nouvelle Mystery, an

A review of The Voice of Aliette NouvelleThis book is an interesting variation on the basic detective story. It is quietly paced, more of a psychological puzzle than an action-oriented mystery. I think that is part of the point: This book is gently funny in the way it portrays macho men who dream of action with a capital "A".As a female character, Inspector Aliette Nouvelle is engaging and believable. She is 35, single. She is doing well at her job. She is still looking for answers in her personal life. Her cat Piaf sits on the end of her bed as she sips a beer and reads alone at night. She uses the Billings Method of natural birth control to keep track of her body's rhythms which link her to the world. As a cop, Aliette has a way of "getting to" men, both colleagues and adversaries. (To say more would wreck the story.)Inspector Nouvelle's assignment is to find a long-lost Public Enemy # 1. The story is set in an unnamed mid-sized city in present-day France. The author, who is from Canada, puts in enough authentic local color to let us feel the French environment - the Palace of Justice, shops in the dark, labyrinth-like streets of the Old City, the Vosges Mountains in the distance, a busy Rond-Point with a suave gendarme directing the daily flow of traffic. My only problem was waiting for this story to become the usual kind of cop story. Once I accepted Aliette's way of doing it, I enjoyed it. The conclusion conveys some useful meaning in today's violence-prone world. I would be interested in reading another Inspector Aliette Nouvelle story from this writer.