Murder, She Writes
The discipline she found freed her as a
writer. She embraced the structure of books her mother had loved, the popular
mysteries written by Britain’s great crime novelist:
“It’s absolutely true; I was raised on
the ristish crime novel: P.D. James. Ngaio Marsh, and, of course, Agatha
Christie. I read widely, but I loved murder mysteries. It’s a form that I
understand. There’s a beginning, there’s a middle, there’s an end, there’s a
murder, there’s an investigation, there’s a resolution. And that structure is
not confining. I fact, just the opposite. That’s simply the girders on which
all the other elements can be hung. A murder mystery, a crime novel…what better
way to explore human nature than when it’s challenged and shattered like that
and you have to pick up the pieces. Hamlet was a crime novel!”
At the heart of each crime novel is the
act of murder. That act Penny finds endlessly fascinating: “Murder is such as a
violation and at the same time a part of being human. I don’t think there are
very many of us who haven’t thought, ‘What would drive me to murder?’ That’s
really at the core of it. It is so deeply human.”
Her first novel, Still Life, is
set in a fictitious, picturesque, arty, and not so peaceful Quebec village
called Three Pines. www.louisepenny.com
describes the book’s central mystery:
“As the early morning mist clears on
Thanksgiving Sunday, the homes of Three Pines come to life all except one… To
local, the village is a safe haven. So they are bewildered when a well-loved
member of the community is found lying dead in the maple woods. Surely it was
an accident a hunter’s arrow gone astray. Who could want Jane Neal dead?”
The subsequent investigation introduces
Penny’s charming, compassionate, and perceptive central character, Chief
Inspector Armand Gamache of the Sureté du Québe, as well as many of
vivid, colourful characters who call Three Pine home.
At first, no one wanted Still Life.
Rejection slips piled up on Penny’s desk. Finally, she sent a manuscript
to England, entering a first-novel competition called Debut Dagger, a
contest created by Britain’s Crime Writer’s Association. Out of 800
entries in 2004, she took a highly-praised
second place. Publishers noticed. And once she was in print, critics
flagged
her as a writer to watch. “An auspicious debut,” said the New York Times;
“impressive… promising” echoed the London Times, Publisher’s Weekly
simply called it “terrific.”
Next, in what has become the Three
Pines/Chief Inspector Gamache series, came Dea Cold (a spectator is
found electrocuted at a local curling match), then The Cruellest Month
(a suspicious death among a group exploring an abandoned, “evil” house), then A
Rule Against Murder (a genteel family returns to town; there is murder at
the Manoir Bellechasse). Her fifth was The Brutal Telling (a mysterious
stranger found dead in the local bistro); the sixth is Bury Your Dead (murder
discovered deep in a long locked room in an ancient library in Quebec City). Seven years and seven fascinating mysteries later, A Trick of the Light
was hailed as “stellar,” “stunning,” “superb…masterful,” and “top of the
genre.” US publishing trade paper Kirkus Reviews compared her to the
very best, noting:
“Penny, elevating herself to the
pantheon that houses P.D. James, Ruth Rendell, and Minette Walters, and Minette
Walters, demonstrates an exquisite touch with characterization, plotting, and
artistic sensitivity.”
The Lump in the Throat
With her name shining on numerous
bestseller lists, this engaging author clearly enjoys her success. She also
keeps it very much in perspective. Penny chuckles as she illustrates the
difference between fame and lack of it:
“I didn’t tour with the first book. And
it was quite a blow to my ego, because of course this has been lifelong dream.
I would lie in the bubble bath and practice my Oprah interview and imagine what
it would be like to have a book published cocktail parties and penthouse suites
and everybody fawning. The reality was, ‘No, we’re not going to tour you
because frankly we can’t be bothered and nobody knows who you are.’ And with
the second book, they did tour me and it was thrilling to get my itinerary and
there were flights in cargo, of course, on ‘Bob’s Airlin.’ But they were
absolutely right; even after a certain amount of success with the third, nobody
turned out. I spoke to caretakers, I spoke to janitors, I spoke to people who
just wanted me to stop speaking so they could close up the room. It was
horrific. And then this fall, hundreds of people. Packed. It was
wonderful. But I don’t take this for granted. No part of me stands in front of
a room full of people all holding my book and thinks, ‘Yeah, well, this is
pretty much par for the course.’ “
A Trick of the Light is set in motion at a Montreal vernissage in the
exotic and highly competitive world of big league art and artists. Into this
scene, Penny places a grateful and self-effacing painter named Clara Morrow
whose great talent lies undiscovered until her middle years. Proud of her work,
but not quite sure she belongs, Clara approaches the site of her gallery
opening at Montreal’s Musée d’Art Contemporain. As Penny writes:
“Clara’s hands grew cold and numb as she
moved slowly forward, propelled by an undeniable force, a rude mix of
excitement and terror. She wanted to rush towards the doors, yank them open and
yell, ‘Here I am!’ But mostly she wanted to turn and flee, to hide. To stumble
back down the long, long, light-filled, art-filled, marble-filled hallway. To
admit she’d made a mistake.”
“Yes,” Penny laughs, “I think anyone who
knows me knows that I’m Clara. I’m actually, of course, elements of most of
characters. Their most rancid emotions are certainly mine.”
This fall there will be a new, eight
Three Pines/Chief Inspector Gamache novels. For a number of months each year,
Penny gathers material, noting ideas, bits of poems and dialogue, new arcs for
her characters. Ultimately, to find the core of a new novel, she clears her
mind:
“I’m trying to sit quietly, I’m trying
to, in some way, not gather material, but just let it come to me, to be open to
it. I know it sounds kind of ‘ woo-woo’ and magical but…Robert Frost describes
his poems beginning as a lump in the throat and that’s it…my books begin as a
lump in the throat some emotion deeply left. Then I figure out a way to express
that.”
Finding Home
As her fame grows, Penny finds quiet
matters more. “I’m finding as I get older and I know from my friends that I’m
far from unusual in this that we tend to get simpler. Our needs are simpler,
and my needs certainly are simpler. Michael and I live basically on the side of
a mountain. [They spend most of the year in a brick cottage near the pretty
town of Sutton, Quebec, an hour southeast of Montreal.] We have a few a good
friends and lots of acquaintances, a dog [Trudy, a golden retriever]. It’s a
simple life. We don’t need much. I need my Gummi Bears and that’s about it.”
For all early pain in her journey,
Louise Penny’s happiness is palpable today. In conversation, she’s a warm,
vibrant presence self-deprecating, good-natured, and bright spirited. She feel
lucky to have found a place that sustains her:
“Quebec is home. We talk about
themes in
the book. Another huge theme in belonging, is community. In all my
books. Three
Pines is about belonging. About finding your place, with friends. And I
realize
that for much of my life, I have been in search of home. And I’ve found
it in Quebec. Which is odd. I’m basically a unilingual, English,
middle-aged woman, and I have
found it in the countryside of Quebec a place that never makes me feel
like I’m
a stranger, an outsider. It was important to me that these books become
love
letters to Quebec, and to my neighbours and my friends and to a province
that has
finally made me feel like I belong.”
Penny elaborates on her website: “The
Chief Inspector Gamache books, while clearly crime fiction, are not, in fact,
about murder or even death. They’re really about life. And friendship. About
belonging and choices. And how very difficult it can be, how much courage it
can take, to be kind.”
And the fascinating village of Three Pines, where her characters come to life. Is it real to her? Or an impossible
Utopia ? Louise Penny is happy to tell you what, with luck, she has learned:
“Clearly, it physically doesn’t exist,
but I think of it as an allegory. I think it exists for me in a way that’s much
more important than a physical place. On the days when I choose to be kind, on
the days when I choose forgiveness those are the days when I live in Three
Pines. And there are days when I am none of those things. And it doesn’t feel
very good. But I can find my way back to it because I know that Three Pines
exists. And the passport is kindness.”
