A World of Curiosities: 18 (Chief Inspector Gamache Novel)

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Armand and Ren-Marie are a model loving couple, and their family is by now a model, too. Goodness, kindness, prevails, and as things seem to get worse in the world (and in the books), Gamache’s insistent ethical messages get all the more insistent. “Cosies” were the way the early books were described; even Penny said the murders in the books were sort of incidental to her characters and their world.

Fortunately, I have never had anything as horrendous as the actions in this novel to forgive. I have a tendency to hold onto something and gnaw on it for quite a while until I finally am ready to stop and begin moving forward. I find as I am getting older (and hopefully wiser) this time is shortening. Giving forgiveness, including to myself, allows me to grow and continue on my path in a meaningful way instead of stagnating. Penny does not make you wait for it. Every chapter takes hold and propels you forward. You do not want to put it down. It frothed up the already tumultuous lake, creating waves on the waves. Shoving the dead woman ever forward, offering her to Gamache. Insisting he take her. Simply outstanding… Penny’s gift for intelligent and transcendent storytelling delivers light, bringing themes of forgiveness and redemption to society’s darker moments.” — Christian Science Monitor The objects were collected by Sir Robert and Sir William who made acquisitions on a long journey travelling through Europe and on to Cairo and Jerusalem. The collection consisted of over 200 objects and included many natural curiosities made into decorative art objects, such as mounted seashells and ostrich eggs. The painting was unknown for centuries, and before it was donated to the Norwich Castle Museum in 1947, its last owner warned that it was "very faded, of no artistic value, only curious from an archaeological point of view." [4] It is now on display, with the strombus shell in an enamelled mount, as part of the Norwich Castle Museum Collection.Even though I have read all the Inspector Gamache books by Louise Penny, this is my first review of one (I think)! When Chief Inspector Armand Gamache first had Jean-Guy Beauvoir in his sights, Jean-Guy was a green, arrogant young man although Armand could see something in him that he wanted to nurture. The first case they worked together was a horrific one - the abuse of two young children and the death of their mother. Now, all those years later, those two young people were in Three Pines and Armand was uneasy. But it was when a long hidden room was discovered, one that had been hidden for one hundred and fifty years, that events in the lives of the Three Pines villagers, as well as Armand, Jean-Guy and the Surete du Quebec investigators, changed.

I was just thinking about Anne Lamarque. . . She was punished for many things, including being happy. So I wanted to capture that. The power of it. Happiness as an act of defiance. A revolutionary act."Travel is very much part of the conscience of the painting, as suggested by the prominence of the terrestrial globe, which is turned to display the Pacific Ocean. If geography and the distance of travel are preoccupations, then so is time and the contemplation of generational continuity. At least two of the treasures depicted were more than seventy years old at the time of painting, having been passed down in the family. Items such as a silver flagon held by the young man (dating to 1598; the pair of flagons now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) and the nautilus cup of 1592 (Prinsenhof Museum, Delft) just in front of the ebony-framed mirror, are juxtaposed with objects that were incredibly fashionable at the time of painting, such as the Gujarati perfume flask with its silver-gilt mounts added in London in the 1660s (private collection). The fleeting nature of the shimmering treasures is further underscored when we realize that other treasures were seized from the family during the English Civil Wars and sold or melted down for cash to fund Cromwell’s war against Charles I.