Louise Boni is an Inspector in the Serious Crime Squad in Germany's Black Forest. An alcoholic with obvious mental issues. Her boss Rolf Bermann sends her to investigate a Japanese monk, who has been beaten, and is walking in the snow of the Freiburg region.
I found the character of Boni just too obnoxious, and the story was really not interesting enough, or maybe the style of writing was not to my taste.
A NetGalley Book. ( )

Freiburg-Krimi, von Brigitte, angelesen

Louise Boni is a seriously damaged and disturbed police inspector in Germany’s Black Forest region. Her inability to come to terms with having shot and killed a suspect some months earlier, along with her fraught family relationships (divorce, estrangement from her parents,...) have driven her to drink and she is about to be put on extended medical leave by her misogynistic boss. She is asked to follow up on a sighting of a Japanese monk walking through the snow. This leads her to murder and human trafficking.

Boni is not a likeable character and I did not become more sympathetic to her situation the more I got to know her. Her always being right and always being one step ahead of the rest of the police team seems to stem more from their stupidity than from her brilliance. Almost every character has lost someone close to them because of Boni’s actions, but she seems to think that her doing what she wanted makes al that waste OK. Actually, she is a mess, but does not really care, at least at the start of the book.

Winter in the Black Forest, small town German insularity and fraught relations between the French and German police are all described extremely well and are only too believable. The plot unravels at a comfortable pace a dn the action draws the reader in.

Overall, a superior read. ( )

Germany, France, friendship, alcohol-issues, international-crime-and-mystery, noir, law-enforcement, Buddhism, trafficking *****

If you're into Scandinavian Noir you'll really appreciate this German voice complete with the ice/snow and the problems for law enforcement with national borders. If you are close to law enforcement personnel you'll easily recognize the way that the job can damage a person who is driven by caring for the innocent, especially after having to kill another human regardless of the horrors he has done.
Despite her alcoholism and other personal demons Louise pursues an innocent monk in sandals and robes through the cold and snow even though they do not speak each other's language only because she knows that he needs help. She pushes on despite getting no support from superiors even after unknown persons murder one officer and critically injure another. It's a very dark mystery, but too much of it is all too likely in any country. It forced me to finish it all in one day.
I believe that translator Jamie Bulloch did an excellent job.
I requested and received a free ebook copy from Dover Publications via NetGalley. Thank you! ( )

Reprends beaucoup des clichés des "polars" mais avec un certain talent. ( )