La toute premiere prise de contact entre le commissaire Maigret et la mort, avec qui il allait vivre des semaines durant dans la plus deroutante des intimites, eut lieu le 27 juin 1930 en des circonstances a la fois banales, penibles et inoubliables. Inoubliables surtout parce que, depuis une semaine, la Police Judiciaire recevait note sur note annoncant le passage a Paris du roi d’Espagne pour le 27 et rappelant les mesures a prendre en pareil cas. Or, le directeur de la P.J. etait a Prague, ou il assistait a un congres de police scientifique. Le sous-directeur avait ete appele dans sa villa de la cote normande par la maladie d’un de ses gosses. Maigret etait le plus ancien des commissaires et devait s’occuper de tout, par une chaleur suffocante, avec des effectifs que les vacances reduisaient au strict minimum. Ce fut encore le 27 juin au petit jour qu’on decouvrit, rue Picpus, une merciere assassinee. Bref, a neuf heures du matin, tous les inspecteurs disponibles etaient partis pour la gare du Bois-de-Boulogne, ou on attendait le souverain espagnol. Maigret avait fait ouvrir portes et fenetres et, sous l’action des courants d’air, les portes claquaient, les papiers s’envolaient des tables. A neuf heures et quelques minutes arrivait un telegramme de Nevers : Emile Gallet, voyageur de commerce, domicilie a Saint-Fargeau, Seine-et-Marne, assassine nuit du 25 au 26, Hotel de la Loire a Sancerre. Nombreux details etranges. Priere prevenir famille pour reconnaissance cadavre. Si possible envoyer inspecteur de Paris.

The second book in the new Penguin Maigret series: Georges Simenon's devastating tale of misfortune, betrayal and the weakness of family ties, in a new translation by Anthea Bell. Instead of the detail filling itself in and becoming clearer, it seemed to escape him. The face of the man in the ill-fitting coat just misted up so that it hardly looked human. In theory this mental portrait was good enough, but now it was replaced by fleeting images which should have added up to one and the same man but which refused to get themselves into focus. The circumstances of Monsieur Gallet's death all seem fake: the name the deceased was travelling under and his presumed profession, and more worryingly, his family's grief. Their haughtiness seems to hide ambiguous feelings about the hapless man. In this haunting story, Maigret discovers the appalling truth and the real crime hidden behind the surface of lies. Penguin is publishing the entire series of Maigret novels in new translations. This novel has been published in previous translations as Maigret Stonewalled and The Death of Monsieur Gallet.

Une edition anniversaire: 10 volumes de "Tout Maigret" avec des couvertures originales creees par Loustal. Pierre Assouline signe une preface inedite pour le tome 1. Maigret, ce sont 75 romans et 28 nouvelles publies entre 1931 et 1972. Ce tome 1 regroupe les huit premiers Maigret parus en 1931. Il est preface par Pierre Assouline, biographe de Simenon, qui lui a notamment consacre un Autodictionnaire Simenon, un documentaire, et vient d'adapter plusieurs romans de Simenon pour le theatre radiophonique. Pietr-le-Letton Le Charretier de "La Providence" Monsieur Gallet, decede Le Pendu de Saint-Pholien La Tete d'un homme Le Chien jaune La Nuit du carrefour Un crime en Hollande Notes de Michel Carly

He needed to get out of his office, soak up the atmosphere and discover different worlds with each new investigation. He needed the cafes and bars where he so often ended up waiting, at the counter, drinking a beer or a calvados depending on the circumstances. He needed to do battle patiently in his office with a suspect who refused to talk and sometimes, after hours and hours, he'd obtain a dramatic confession. In Simenon's final novel featuring Inspector Maigret, the famous detective reaches a pivotal moment in his career, contemplating his past and future as he delves into the Paris underworld one last time, to investigate the case of a missing lawyer.

Voila longtemps que Nathalie Sabin-Levesque sait a quoi s'en tenir sur les fugues de son mari. Tandis qu'elle sombre peu a peu dans l'alcool, rejetee par l'entourage de ce confortable notaire du faubourg Saint-Germain, Gerard, qui ne l'aime plus, se distrait dans les boites de nuit des Champs-Elysees, ou les professionnelles le connaissent sous le nom de monsieur Charles. Mais cela fait un mois maintenant que Gerard n'a pas reparu... C'est a l'histoire d'un couple depuis longtemps desuni que Maigret va s'interesser ici, telle que lui permettent de la reconstituer les temoignages des amis et des domestiques. Et a une femme dont l'ascension sociale aura ete payee du prix de la solitude et de la decheance.

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. Maigret's peaceful retirement in the countryside is disrupted when a relative unwittingly embroils himself in a crime he did not commit and the inspector returns to Police Headquarters in Paris once again.

'She tried to laugh, but was sobbing at the same time. She attempted to stand up and fell over, but she didn't shatter like the glass' Alone and adrift after losing everything in a divorce, Betty finds her life sliding dangerously out of control. When an older woman, Laure, discovers her drunk in a Paris restaurant and nurses her back to health, she is given another chance. But Betty is damaged, consumed by darkness. As the truth about her past, and her nature, emerges, it threatens to consume Laure too. Originally published in 1961, this gripping psychological thriller caused a sensation and inspired a film adaptation by Claude Chabrol.

In his mind's eye he would see that slim figure in the striking clothes, those wide eyes the colour of forget-me-not, the pert nose and especially the hat, that giddy, crimson bonnet perched on the top of her head with a bronze-green feather shaped like a blade stuck in it . . . Felicie had given him more trouble than all the 'hard' men who had been put behind bars. This novel has been published in a previous translation as Maigret and the Toy Village.

Avant d’ouvrir les yeux, Maigret fronca les sourcils, comme s’il se fut mefie de cette voix qui venait lui crier tout au fond de son sommeil : – Mon oncle !… Les paupieres toujours closes, il soupira, tatonna le drap de lit et comprit qu’il ne revait pas, qu’il se passait quelque chose puisque sa main n’avait pas rencontre, la ou il eut du etre, le corps chaud de Mme Maigret. Il ouvrit enfin les yeux. La nuit etait claire. Mme Maigret, debout pres de la fenetre a petits carreaux, ecartait le rideau cependant qu’en bas quelqu’un secouait la porte et que le bruit se repercutait dans toute la maison. – Mon oncle ! C’est moi…

L'Amerique du Sud, cela peut faire rever. Le canal de Panama… les Antilles… la jeune puissance americaine qui grandit, la fortune possible et l'exotisme des paysages, l'excitation de l'aventure, le risque de croiser d'anciens forcats de Cayenne... Cela peut aussi devenir l'enfer : une mort lente sous les tropiques. Joseph, fiance depuis deux ans et marie depuis peu, debarque a Panama dans la zone du Canal. Il croyait faire escale et se retrouve bloque. La compagnie qui l'embauchait a fait faillite. Plus de ressources. Pas d'argent. Joseph ne sait plus que faire. Son epouse, si jeune, le regarde autrement. Que sait-il d'elle finalement? Que sait-elle de lui? Entre espoir, survie et quartier reserve aux putes a matelots, quelle sera la fin?

It had a smell of holidays. The previous evening, in Cannes harbour, with the setting sun, had also had the smell of holidays, especially the Ardena, whose owner swaggered in front of two girls with gorgeous figures.. Dazzled at first by the glamour of sunny Antibes, Maigret soon finds himself immersed in the less salubrious side of the Riviera as he retraces the final steps of a local eccentric.

Captain Lannec has finally managed to buy his own ship with the financial help of his in-laws, the Pitards - and they've never let him forget it. When his temperamental wife Mathilde insists on coming along on the ship's first voyage, Lannec becomes increasingly unnerved by her presence, especially when he receives an anonymous note saying he won't make it back to port. As they hit a storm in the Atlantic, jealousy, spite, snobbery and suspicion are churned up in the boat's stiflingly close quarters... First published in 1935, The Pitards was one of the first novels Simenon wrote when he shelved his famous Maigret series in order to strike out in a new direction and make a name for himself as a literary writer. This gripping evocation of life at sea revolves around class and the tense unravelling of relationships, powerful themes that Simenon would return to throughout his writing career.

'Maigret would have found it difficult to formulate an opinion of him. Intelligent, yes, certainly, and highly so, as far as one could tell from what lay beneath some of his utterances. Yet alongside that, there was a naive, rather childish side to him.' Maigret is savouring a beautiful spring morning in Paris when an aspiring film-maker draws his attention to a much less inspiring scene, one where ever-changing loyalties can have tragic consequences. Penguin is publishing the entire series of Maigret novels in new translations.

A small, thin man, rather dull to look at, neither young nor old, exuding the stale smell of a bachelor who does not look after himself. He pulls his fingers and cracks his knuckles and tells his tale the way a schoolboy recites his lesson. A mysterious note predicting the murder of a fortune-teller; a confused old man locked in a Paris apartment; a financier who goes fishing; a South American heiress ... Maigret must make his way through a frustrating maze of clues, suspects and motives to find out what connects them. Penguin is publishing the entire series of Maigret novels in new translations. This novel has been published in previous translations as To Any Lengths and Maigret and the Fortuneteller.

In everyone's eyes, even the old ladies hiding behind their quivering curtains, even the kids just now who had turned to stare after they had passed him, he was the intruder, the undesirable. No, worse, he was fundamentally untrustworthy, some stranger who had just turned up from who knew where to do who knew what. Maigret's old colleague becomes an unexpected rival in book twenty-four of the new Penguin Maigret series. Penguin is publishing the entire series of Maigret novels in new translations. This novel has been published in a previous translation as Maigret's Rival.

They ran into cloud cover as they approached the French coast and flew up above it. Through a break in the clouds a little later, Maigret caught a lucky glimpse of the sea, sparkling as if covered in silvery scales, and fishing-boats trailing a wake of foam. His neighbour leaned across amicably to point out the white cliffs, explaining: 'That's Dover ...' When Maigret's prized gun goes missing, he must travel to London on the trail of a troubled young man on the run.