From Booklist
One year before the publication of the first Inspector Maigret story, Simenon published a series of stories about another Parisian sleuth, the icy, cerebral examining magistrate Monsieur Froget. These 13 Froget stories, never before published in English, were the third part of a hit series Simenon wrote for Detective Magazine in 1929-30. The series created a sensation because the endings were not given till several issues later, giving readers the opportunity to write in their own conclusions. Both the Froget stories and their endings appear here. The focus is on social isolates--a spy, an aging "male coquette," a family of bicycle circus performers--who come in contact with the law in the person of M. Froget, who exercises both police and judicial powers. This is a world of seedy apartments, falling-apart people, and thwarted ambition. Froget encounters them all with cold stares and crushing remarks. This is a wonderful collection, revealing a different side of Simenon and opening a window onto a vanished world. Translator Schulman provides an absorbing introduction, explaining Simenon's work habits, the differences between Maigret and the three other sleuths of the Detective series, and the peculiarities of Froget's world, the Paris of the 1920s. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
This is a wonderful collection. -- Connie Fletcher, Booklist, September 1, 2002
