The Sleeping Car Murders - Sebastien Japrisot translated by Francis Price

If you’ve a few hours to spare and a penchant for a french noir murder mystery look no further. A perfect lockdown read to absorb you and get you thinking. A ‘whodunit’ to be sure but also a ‘howdunnit’ and ‘whydunit’ to boot! 

Japrisot has an easy, flowing style, fusing plot and narrative together, serving us red herrings Parisian style and leading us up and down a few garden paths. He introduces us to various characters who we relate to with varying degrees of affection. But beware before you get too attached. Not all of them survive! It’s a relatively short book too but as much happens in it as you’d find in a book twice its length. You need to pay attention, the complexities of the plot are therefore concentrated and create a mood of suspense and tension. 

'A beautiful young woman lies sprawled on her berth in the sleeping car of the night train from Marseilles to Paris. She is not in the embrace of sleep, or even in the arms of one of her many lovers. She is dead. And the unpleasant task of finding her killer is handed to an overworked, crime-weary police detective named Pierre Emile Grazziano, nicknamed Grazzi, who would rather play hide-and-seek with his little son than cat and mouse with a diabolically cunning, savage murderer.'

Detective Grazziano - ‘Grazzi’ ’s journey to the truth is almost a metaphor for the train journey described in this novel. He stops at several stations and examines many tickets before he finally reaches Destination Truth. I don’t think even the most astute of readers will arrive there ahead of him. Okay, well, maybe one or two! I had my suspicions but no certainty.   

If you’re looking for a contemporary, high tech, forensic friendly tale you won’t get it but you will get a sixties style crime tale that embraces many of the qualities found in Golden Age of Crime works. The locations may be French and the names may be French but the tale itself nestles comfortably within a universal crime genre. 

Having previously read ‘the Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun it was interesting to read another work by Japrisot. And my conclusion is that he is/was a skilled and diverse weaver of words! My thanks to Gallic Books for a copy  of this most entertaining thriller.