Inspector Maigret

When Detective Chief Inspector Maigret receives notice from Interpol that Pietr the Latvian, an infamous con man, is on his way to Paris, he rushes to intercept him at the train station. But when he arrives he is confounded to find two men who fit the description of the wanted man. One is alive, the other dead.

A Monsieur Gallet has been found dead—murdered—in his hotel room, in a small town outside of Paris. In Georges Simenon’s The Late Monsieur Gallet, Inspector Maigret sets off to figure out the course of events that led to this grim outcome. But as he delves deeper, the circumstances of the crime become increasingly intriguing: Gallet’s alias, his sickly pallor, his claimed profession, his wife’s and son’s strangely indifferent behavior in the wake of Gallet’s death.

While stopped at a railway station on the northern edge of Holland, Inspector Maigret catches sight of a traveler acting oddly: the man glances around furtively, pulls out handfuls of coins to pay for purchases, and guards a small suitcase. Maigret decides to follow the man, thinking he’ll help catch a crook—but then the inspector witnesses something terrible. The stranger leaves behind only a passport with a false name and an old, large, dirty gray suit. Struck by guilt, Maigret resolves to figure out who this man was and why events ended so tragically.

It’s just another slow, rainy day on a French canal, until the discovery of a woman’s body disrupts the placid scene. Inspector Maigret is baffled by the facts of the case: an expensively dressed woman, Mary Lampson, has been strangled in a nearby stable, with no road nearby wide enough for automobile traffic. Only by chance was her body found, without a noise, witness, or trace of mud to aid in explaining the scene. How did this glamorous, pearl-laden woman meet her end?

Late at night in a small seaside town, not a single light is on, and everyone is asleep. Or almost everyone: a man, drunk, departs for home after another evening at a hotel bar, where he and a few others regularly gather. Suddenly, he collapses—struck by a gunshot. The victim turns out to be the town’s most successful wine dealer, and the event soon leads to a series of other curiosities: poisoned drinks at the bar, another man found missing, and a dirty yellow dog haunting the neighborhood, accompanied by large, unfamiliar boot tracks.

It’s been seventeen hours of interrogation, yet Carl Andersen’s air of elegance remains unruffled. Inspector Maigret is bewildered by the behavior exhibited by the only probable suspect of the case at Three Widows Crossroads, the location of Carl’s isolated mansion where he lives with his sister Else. The Saturday evening prior, Carl and Else go to sleep, after Carl has locked her away in her bedroom as usual—a curious habit, notes Maigret, but stranger things soon arise.

A French professor is staying in a coastal Dutch town while on a lecture tour—but when his host is murdered, he’s held for questioning as the prime suspect. Maigret’s assistance is requested, so he travels to the northeast of Holland, where he meets the attendees of a small private gathering the week before: Beetje, the coquettish daughter of a local farmer; Madame Popinga, the victim’s wife; Any Van Elst, her sister and a prospective lawyer; and Cornelius, a student at the Naval College; among a few others.

A fishing boat docks at a port in Normandy—and hours later its captain is floating in the harbor, strangled to death. When Inspector Maigret arrives, at the behest of his old school friend, he finds the Océan’s crew will say nary a word about what transpired; instead, they speak only of the evil eye, a curse on the vessel they believe began even before they sailed. Pierre Le Clinche, a young wireless operator on board the ship who had markedly strained relations with the captain, is arrested for foul play.

A man escapes out of the High Surveillance wing of the most infamous penitentiary in Paris. Members of the Police Judiciaire see him, but no one moves a muscle. In fact, it’s part of a daring plan concocted by Inspector Maigret, who thinks Joseph Heurtin may not be guilty of the murder of Madame Henderson and her maid—despite Maigret’s having convicted Joseph himself months before. Once on the loose, Joseph is the subject of careful surveillance: will the accused return to his ring of criminal masterminds, or is he indeed as unknowing as he maintained in every interrogation?

Somewhere in Liège, Jean Chabot and René Delfrosse hide out in the cellar of a seedy bar. Their plan to rob the establishment goes awry when, by the light of a match, they see the dead body of a man whom they had seen only hours before. They flee in horror. When the two boys are accused of the murder, their friendship is put to the test, and seemingly irrelevant social differences threaten their friendship and their freedom.

On the eve of his death, a condemned man remembers a crime he witnessed years before. With only the name of a bar to direct him, Maigret joins a party of summering revelers who have something to do with the unsolved disappearance—but what, exactly? Descending into the sleazy underside of respectable Parisian life, Maigret investigates and the forgotten crime comes to light.

On the dimly lit Place des Vosges, Maigret hears the sound of a woman in distress. But this is no crime; she is giving birth in a room above. The lights of the apartments across the courtyard flicker, and Maigret sees shadowy figures at the windows. Behind one is a dead man and an empty safe. As one life begins, another has come to a dark end.

An evocative tale from Georges Simenon that unearths the inspector’s past: Maigret finds an anonymous note predicting a crime in his hometown. This handwritten note is deposited at the headquarters of the Police Judiciaire in Paris. Maigret sets off for the village, having been there last for his father’s funeral.

In The Flemish House, Maigret arrives in the rainy, flood-prone town of Givet on the Belgian border to solve the case of a missing young woman. He has been hired by the wealthy Peeters family, who are suspected of being responsible, to clear their name. As he plumbs the mysteries, prejudices, and hidden dramas of this town caught between two worlds, he has to decide whether there was foul play involved in the vanishing of the young woman, or if she has simply been chased away by the oppressive air of this benighted and fraught no-man’s-land.

The Madman of Bergerac finds Maigret on the train to Bordeaux trying to sleep, to no avail. A man in the bunk above is tossing and turning, perhaps even crying. Suddenly, the passenger jumps up, then jumps off the moving train. Maigret instinctively follows suit but is struck down, shot in the shoulder. When he reawakens, he’s hospitalized and surrounded by officials—who think he is the local murderer.

A man, clad in brand-new clothes with no identification, is found on the streets of Paris. Mute, he also has a bullet hole in his head that has been perfectly patched up—altogether a strange fellow, yet affable. His maid Julie soon turns up to claim him; he is Captain Yves Joris, the harbormaster at Ouistreham. Maigret accompanies the pair safely back home, but the next morning, the captain dies, poisoned. Maigret decides to stay, pacing the thickly fog-obscured docks, striking up conversations with busy figures.

Georges Simenon’s Maigret arrives in Antibes on the French Riviera tasked with discreetly solving the murder of one Mr. Brown, stabbed in the back as he returned to the house of his mistress and her mother. As Maigret investigates, he finds himself drawn to the seedy dive bar frequented by the late Mr. Brown, and strangely absorbed in his ruminations on the many secret lives of this cipher of a man. Is Maigret simply distracted by the sun, surf, and vacationers, or is there something else about the case that is preoccupying him?

Emile Ducrau, the kingpin of a small town on the outskirts of Paris, is stabbed and left for dead in the harbor one night. When he’s pulled from the water and miraculously revived, he enlists the help of Maigret to figure out who was behind the attempted murder. As Maigret sorts through the complex web of deceit, abuse, money, and power that darken Emile’s many dealings in the town, he must also deal with the specter of his own looming retirement.

When Maigret’s police officer nephew is framed for a gangland murder, the former chief inspector must swap his countryside retirement for his old stomping ground: Paris’s seamy underworld. Fueled by regular tipples and his omnipresent pipe, he goes up against a criminal enterprise whose leader, a police informant, considers himself untouchable. Can Maigret’s forensic but off-the-books investigation save his nephew from prison—and uphold his own legacy as a peerless maverick for justice?

A new translation of this gripping novel which sees the inspector brought out of his peaceful retirement. Maigret shrugged his shoulders, buried his hands in his pockets and went off without answering. He had just spent one of the most wretched days in his life. For hours, in his corner he had felt old and feeble, without idea or incentive. But now a tiny flame flickered. 'You bet we'll see' he growled.