The Missing Corpse by Jean-Luc Bannalec (2020)

If I had to choose one word to describe this book, it would be ‘frustrating.’ The protagonist frustrated me, the side characters frustrated me, and even small word choices and phrasings frustrated me. But I am getting ahead of myself.

This is a crime novel. We follow our protagonist, a commissaire (a high ranking police official - in this novel, he is more or less a head detective) in Brittany, which is a small area in France. In this idyllic, picturesque little town a murder happens, and it is up to our hero to save the day and solve the case. I will admit that I have not read many mystery novels; the most recent in memory are those of Edgar Allen Poe, which were… we’ll say ‘rewarding’ reads, albeit not particularly pleasurable. I think by modern standards this one does a much better job throwing the reader right in: the body is found almost immediately upon starting the story, and we’re already on to trying to figure out whodunnit, piecing the motive together as we read along.

Or at least, that is how I think it should have been written.

Before I become (overly) critical of this novel, I would like to preface by noting that I did not realize that this was part of a greater series before having started. Many of my gripes may be irrelevant if the rest of the series explains it. I almost didn’t bother writing my thoughts out because I felt lost on a lot of character moments. But it’s my blog and I read the book so I will spout my ignorant opinion.

I will start with something positive: this book has a LOT of charm when considering little pieces of trivia about the region it takes place in. I had never heard of Brittany before this, and by the end I could tell you about many of its wonderful qualities, including seafood, the scenery, the people, the history, local fauna. It is evident that the author has a great deal of love for this region, and it comes through all the way throughout the book.

Regrettably, this is where my praise stops. Because most of this location is spoiled by the people, starting with our lead. I’m not quite sure what it takes to become a commissaire, but based on this story it doesn’t seem like much. Our protagonist over the course of the story finds no real evidence, leaves most critical thinking to others, and blindly trusts some of the most immediately sketchy people. I’m not sure if the intent was to pull a ‘gotcha!’ when revealing the killer, but by the time we get to the big reveal it doesn’t feel earned. I didn’t really care who it was because by that point our fool of a policeman had done next to nothing to solve it. It was always side characters who brought or found the information. Granted, some of the ideas were his, and there should be credit given for that, but his ideas always came in the form of ‘hunches’ or ‘instinct.’ It didn’t feel like there was any concrete reasoning behind it; our hero thinks this person is suspicious, so they are. He doesn’t think this person is, so they aren’t. How can we be sure? Let’s send every detective to collect every single piece of information we can get about every possible suspect in the novel. Brilliant.

I found the side characters more interesting at first, but thinking about it more I realized that all of them serve to placate the lead. Now this is expected in a novel: a supporting cast is meant to either challenge or support the main character. But unfortunately, the characters here only make the lead seem… worse? And in very odd ways. He is extremely hostile to almost every male colleague he has (save for one indigenous police officer, who we see twice), in some instances with little to no reason for it; conversely, every female colleague of his can do no wrong and even their most outlandish suggestions are taken as brilliant insights. This is not to say that in many instances the male characters should be admonished, nor is it to say that his female colleagues should be praised, but it is blatantly written in such a way that the only ‘good guy,’ if you will, is our lead. Let’s look at two examples: one of his detectives, a man, often goes on tangents about Brittany. Our lead shuts him up very quickly, and he expresses annoyance. His other colleague with a similar habit, who is a woman, does the same thing and this soothes our hero. The other example I find particularly egregious: our lead is star-struck when he meets someone he thinks is one of his favourite actors. She, however, is extremely suspicious throughout the entire book: she is the first witness; her memory is known to be a bit off; she intentionally withholds information from the police until it’s convenient; and worst of all, she actively defends and is good friends with the perpetrator (spoilers). Even AFTER the case has been solved, and the villain confesses, this woman BELIEVES our lead made a mistake, and HE STILL doesn’t think she’s a little bit suspicious. Our lead gave more suspicious glances at male characters in other countries who could NOT have physically performed the crime than to this woman. I thought the author was going to pull a bait and switch, either make her the villain or make her a major red herring by accident, but I found her absolutely horrible in the context of the greater plot. I would like to re-iterate that the lead was right to chastise the idiots on the team (who were often men) and to praise the hard working detectives/officers (who were often women), but the clear double standard in some cases really rubbed me the wrong way, especially when it came to the suspects. As well, if the goal was for a more feminist angled story (which I’m not sure it was), then I might advise against having the women get what amounts to 0 credit at the end. I’m not sure that getting invited to the protagonists party is really a ‘thank you.’

Beyond the plot and characters, I also found the writing a touch bland. It was definitely nice to read a proper novel after the last book, but I found myself struggling to pay attention and would have to re-read passages quite a bit. Part of this is certainly a me problem, but I have found the other book I’m currently reading I do not have the same issue to the same extent. This isn’t much of a concrete criticism as I cannot think of any examples, but I did struggle to read it.

Overall, what could have been a really interesting murder mystery ended up being a shallow, somewhat boring mess. While I liked the location (and yes, I did like the side characters when they were allowed to talk), I did not much care for the rest of it. Keep in mind that I haven’t read the rest of the series, but after this I don’t feel much inclined to.

Verdict: 2/5