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The Currently Reading Podcast
A Journey to Three Pines - Episode 8: The Beautiful Mystery
01:21:42
We are so excited to journey with you to Three Pines, the fictional French-Canadian village created by Louise Penny for her Three Pines series, featuring Armand Gamache. This spin-off podcast series will tackle each of the books in the series in turn,...
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- [00:00]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Foreigners. Welcome to A Journey to Three Pines in this special limited edition series from the Currently Reading podcast. We are doing a deep exploration of each book in Louise Penny's Three Pine mystery series and we are diving so deep into it.
- [00:36]
Roxanna Kasimkara
We'll delve into the mysteries, of course, but we'll also talk about the characters we love so much, the delightful village of Three Pines, and probably even chat about all the delicious meals they feast on, washed down with a bowl of cafe au lait.
- [00:49]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
We'll discuss everything from the themes Penny explores to why we love Armand Gamache and all the rest so very much. I'm Meredith Monday Schwartz co the Currently Reading Podcast and the Three Pines series is my favorite book series of all.
- [01:04]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Time and I'm Roxanna Kasimkara, a Canadian reader and show regular on the Currently Reading podcast. I'm making my way through the series and loving it. In today's episode we'll focus on the Beautiful Mystery, the eighth in the series. And yes, this series must, absolutely must be read in order.
- [01:23]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And we will also say right at the top of this podcast that we are going to be diving deep into Beautiful Mystery. There will be spoilers, so if you haven't read this book yet, you're going to want to press pause and come back when you've got that reading in. We'll be discussing each book in context of the series as a whole, but we'll save the portions of the discussion for the end of the episode. If we think that those that part of the discussion is going to ruin anything beyond A Beautiful Mystery, does that make sense? So we will be spoiling A Beautiful Mystery, but not any books that come afterwards. All right, Roxanna, let's start the way we always do and that's get into a few details to kind of set the stage for our book. As we said, A Beautiful Mystery is the eighth book in the series. It came out on August 28, 2012, and it came out obviously in hardback. It's 384 pages. As we sit here today, it has a 4.2 rating on Goodreads in over 85,000 reviews. How do you think a 4.2 sounds?
- [02:30]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Roxanna I'm surprised that it's that high. Even just simply from the reader feedback we got when we said we were doing number eight. This is a very polarizing book. So I'm, I'm, I'm actually like excited that people said that because I think, you know, people are seeing what Penny was trying to do. But I will say I'M I thought it might have a more, you know, a lower rating, be based on sort of uneven reviews.
- [02:56]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yes, exactly. It is very, very interesting to me that it was a. That it was a 4.2. I will tell you that when it came out in 2012, it won several awards and all the big awards in the mystery genre. It won the Agatha in 2012 for best novel, it won the Anthony in 2013 for best novel, and it won the Macavity Award in for best novel in 2013. And it won the Audie Award for best mystery novel. So it swept everything that it could possibly sweep. And at this point in the series, this is kind of what we see going forward every time one of her books comes out, which is well deserved, I think. So for this book, I actually could not find a New York Times review, which I think is interesting, but I did find ones from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. Publishers Weekly says traditional mystery fans can look forward to a captivating whodunit plot, a clever fair play clue concealed in plain view, and the deft use of humor to lighten the story's dark patches. On a deeper level, the crime provides a means for Penny's unusually empathic, all too fallible lead to unearth truths about human passions and weaknesses while avoiding simple answers. I will note that this first printing was 150,000 copies up from the 100,000 print run for the previous book, Trick of the Light. So they clearly knew this. This series was beginning to build some momentum. Kirkus's review says, elliptical and often oracular, but also remarkably penetrating and humane. The most illuminating analogies are not to other contemporary detective fiction, but to the Name of the Rose and Murder in the Cathedral. By the way, oracular. I had to look that up.
- [04:49]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I was going to say, I don't know what that means.
- [04:50]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
It means hard to interpret and enigmatic. Okay, all right. So it said this. Kirk has said it was elliptical and often oracular. So that review I think gets to the polarizing nature of this book and, you know, comparing it to the umbetra echoes the Name of the Rose instead of any other detective fiction.
- [05:15]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Well, and can I just say something interesting here, Meredith? Is this one of the first times we finally hear. We don't hear the dreaded words village mystery in any of these reviews.
- [05:26]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
She Abs Louise, Penny made it absolutely impossible to call this a village mystery because of course, we are never in Three Pines in this book.
- [05:36]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I think she was like, listen up, bees. I'm not going to take that anymore. I'm Going to take this out of the village and never shall you pin that on me again. And she was successful, right?
- [05:47]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Exactly. And I do think that this book represents a turning point in a lot of ways in the series, which is interesting. So I will say, because I don't want to forget, we always talk about what is the season that we're in. This is not a necessarily seasonal heavy book, but we are in autumn in this book. And I wanted to ask, before we jump in really deeply, Roxanna, tell me, how many times have you read A Beautiful Mystery?
- [06:17]
Roxanna Kasimkara
So now we're getting, you know, that first part of the series I had read a long time ago. And then I started reading it when we, you know, really started becoming friends in late 2020. So I read this one first in September 2021, just three months after I'd finished A Trick of the Light. So it was relatively fresh in my head when I went in. Well, relatively fresh being like, I remembered it was about a monastery and somewhat boring. That's kind of what I had in my head when I went in. But I didn't remember, like, details of the plot beyond that. So it was a really interesting ride for me.
- [06:53]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Okay, and what format did you, did you do it in both times or each time?
- [06:58]
Roxanna Kasimkara
So first time I did it in digital, as you know, I read it on my Kindle, which is where I usually read these. But this time, Meredith, I decided to follow your example, and I went completely analog. So I set up a reading schedule on my planner. I used a sticky note in my paper book to show me where I needed to get to every night because I thought I might need some structure to get through this. But you know what? It actually, you know, as you know, because I was texting you, you furiously near the end, went a lot quicker than my schedule. And I, I really got through it quickly. So that was really great.
- [07:31]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
All right, good. I've done this one three times. I did it when it came out in 2012 in print. I've done it about six years later in 2018. I did it on audio. And then this time I did a close reading on my iPad, so digitally. So this is my third time through what you described at one point in your reading. And we, we, we try not to do too much in the way of conversation about the book because we know we're going to talk about it here. But I did note that at one point you, you texted me saying that it's. That it's almost aggressively boring.
- [08:08]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yes, there's, there's one that you had called aggressively slow. And I do feel that, you know, we'll talk about the pacing, but yes, this one, I'd say of all the ones we have read so far, this was aggressively boring for, you know, a good portion of it.
- [08:25]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yes, absolutely. All right, so let's first have you give us the setup for the book.
- [08:32]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Okay, so the setup for this one is actually very interesting, as I said, because A Beautiful mystery takes us away from the familiar surroundings of Three Pines and transports us to a remote monastery in Quebec where an ancient form of Gregorian chant known as the Beautiful Mystery has been preserved for centuries. The monks have taken a vow of silence, but their music is renowned worldwide for its purity and transcendence. However, when the choir director, Fr. Mathieu, is found murdered, our very own chief inspector, Armand Gamache and Jean Guy Beauvoir are called in to investigate. This case forces both men to confront their innocence, own inner struggles. Gamache is dealing with the wounds of his past betrayals, and Beauvoir is dealing with deep seated resentment and growing addiction. As the investigation unfolds, the isolation of the mystery heightens the tension, as does the appearance of some unexpected guests. This turns that last section of the novel into a psychological pressure cooker until everything explodes.
- [09:36]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Perfect. Excellent, Excellent summary of this book. So what we're going to do now is we are going to set the stage and sort of enter the book. I'm going to read the first little bit, the very, very starting of the book, of course, the prologue. In the early 19th century, the Catholic Church realized it had a problem. Perhaps it must be admitted, more than one. But the problem that preoccupied it at the moment had to do with the Divine Office. This consisted of eight times in the daily life of a Catholic community when chants were sung. Plain chant, Gregorian chant, simple songs sung by humble monks. Not to put too fine a point on it, the Catholic Church had lost the Divine Office. The different services throughout a religious day were still performed. What were called Gregorian chants were sung here and there in the odd monastery. But even Rome admitted that the chants had strayed so far from the originals that they were considered corrupt, even barbaric. At least in comparison to the elegant and graceful chants of centuries earlier. All right, I have a theory that I'm developing, Roxanna, about this bit, because we do this with every episode. We read the first couple of paragraphs of the story. My theory I'm developing is that those first couple of paragraphs really do tell us so much of what we need to know about what that book is Going to be. And this one is a really good, like we've read some where the first couple of paragraphs you're like, oh my gosh, wait, like, you know, it just grabs you. Yeah. This one, I think so far in these eight books is the most boring.
- [11:22]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah, right. You're right about that. And also no mention of Gamache, Beauvoir, Three Pines, Clara, a murder, nothing. Right. Like, I think the last one started with Clara. Yeah, Clara looking at the door and thinking somebody was coming for her. Right. So you knew there was terror right there. There's, there's none of that here, which is very interesting.
- [11:47]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
No, I mean, at some point I think you're almost like closing the book and going like, wait, am I, did.
- [11:52]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I pick up the right book?
- [11:54]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right, yeah. So right from the get go with this one, it is, we know it's going to be something different. And so I think we have to, like you said, first of all, the beautiful mystery itself, the title is really important. Sometimes her titles are not as important. The title is really important here. I wanted to make sure that we went back from the very beginning. She tells us that the chants, the plain chants, had such a profound effect on those who sang and heard them that the ancient chants became known as the beautiful mystery. Now why is that important? She goes on to say a little bit later on, in trying to capture the beautiful mystery, this monk had invented written music. So that's a really interesting kind of connection. Much further on, toward the end of the book, we learned that while scientists say it's actually alpha waves that are created by hearing this specific, the specific tones of the chants, this is what the, the church calls beautiful mystery. So toward the end of the book, we realize that there is in fact science in that goosebump kind of feeling that, that plain chants give you and how it can really make people who hear it and who sing it feel that they are in communication with God in a different way than any other experience in their physical body can give them to feel it. So it's a really important, I think, base layer to put on the discussion of this story, the concept of the beautiful mystery, because it's a little bit hard at some points in the book to figure out why these people would devote their lives to this, why it's so important, why someone might kill over it, all of these elements of things.
- [13:53]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Well, and I will say this one starts with a prologue and a prologue where the reader learns more. I mean, we don't realize at the time, but we learn more than gamache or Beauvoir or anybody in the book knows until the very end, really. Like, we learn about gnomes, we learn about this, you know, this old monk and how he puts the dot in there and how important that dot is. Right. And you, like, there's a conversation later where Gamache and Beauvoir are talking about it, and, you know, the monks are talking about it. What could this dot mean? And I was struck because I think that's the first time the reader has kind of been like, oh, I know, you know, but. But. But they don't know. And it was an interesting layer of information she gave us at the beginning so we could see the significance. And I wonder if she did that because otherwise a conversation between two monks talking about a dot would be so stiflingly boring if you didn't know the meaning of it that, like, you know, she had to go in and put it in so that. Because you. To wait till the end to find that out, you might have been like, oh, my God, I just don't care. So I wonder if that's why that prologue was in there. But anyway, it was. That was an interesting technique that she hadn't necessarily used before.
- [15:04]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. But I'm gonna admit to you now and to all of our listeners that I read that prologue, and then I promptly forgot that detail.
- [15:14]
Roxanna Kasimkara
You forgot about a dot?
- [15:15]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Meredith, how could. So I was that reader that was like, why are we talking about a dot? Like, so I could tell you. You're right. If you didn't have that detail, it would have been aggressively boring. And it definitely was. But she did give it to us in this prologue. This book is so divisive in the series, and yet it's so important in the series.
- [15:44]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yes.
- [15:45]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. So it is both of these things that people will often ask us, like, can you skip. Are there any books that you can skip? Can I please just skip this book? This is, you know, the third book gets a lot of that. Can I, you know, can I skip it? And then this one. A lot of people are like, you lost me at a beautiful mystery. Because we weren't in the village. We weren't with any of our villagers. We had a murder I just didn't care about. Even once I found out the resolution, we had a group of people affected by the murder that I just didn't care about very much. And so that. But that's the large, largest part of the book. So we have to start talking about the pacing because I don't think we can have any discussion Because I think a lot of people who are going to be listening for the first time may have actually given up on the book itself. And they might be listening to, you know, to kind of get them over the hump of this book. Yeah, yeah.
- [16:48]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Which I can totally understand. You know, I. I feel like, you know, here Penny was like, listen, I've done seven books in Three Pines. You know, I have people following me. I want to try something new. And you know, she has this collage way of writing, right? Like, I've always talked about how she has these subplots and all these other pieces. And in, oh, not number seven, but number six, bury your dead. It was almost frenetic, right? There were so many plots and history and all this stuff happening. And you were like, what is going on? My head is spinning. And then this book you get to, and it's like a monastery with these mugs and nothing going on. And I feel like she just wanted to do something very different and she wanted to set herself a new challenge, which, you know, is a challenge with, as you said, none of Three Pines. But then she has to build herself a whole new atmosphere, right? A whole new setting and all these new characters. And so much of the book is bogged down in building them because not only is she building this new setting that's very beautiful, but frankly not super interesting, but then she's building herself all these characters that are frankly all older white men. Maybe not older, but like they're all white men wearing the same thing. They're all monks, like in. In a lay reader's mind, right? One monk is not that different from the other. So you're hearing about these eight monks, you're trying to keep them straight. I honestly can't still remember who is who. And then you're trying to remember their motivations. And it's a lot. And I think the book, people get bogged down in that and trying to remember all the details. And for her, I think it's super interesting because of all the different motivations and like, you know, she loves contrast, right? The woman loves the contrast. And so the contrast of the outside world and this inside world and people go to escape, but then they're stuck where things are festering. And, you know, the internal motivations of each of these monks, like, I get how that can be super fascinating, but I, like you, was like, okay, you know, who wrote this centuries old chant? Which one of these monks was it? It was just hard for me to keep caring because there weren't a lot of other plots until you got to about two thirds of the way through the book.
- [19:03]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. So it's bookended, I think, with some really interesting stuff. We get the. The first, you know, bit of the book, which is really my favorite. I mean, the ending is my favorite part about this book. The ending is the piece. Right. But. But it doesn't. But it's not fun or good or, you know, you're, like, wrecked. Okay. But my favorite part of the book comes in the. Mostly in the beginning, when, of course, we are finally getting the payoff of the relationship between Zhangi and Annie, which has been building and building and building, and we're finally getting to see them together and them being really happy. And then, you know, you see Zhangi being this totally different person than we've seen him to be, and he finally, like, it just feels like, I'm so glad he's finally getting this level of happiness. And we get the kind of buildup about, when are they going to tell her parents? And, you know, all of those things. And I just love that part of the book. I love that we get some of Armand and Rin Marie. You know, for the. In the last book, Trick of the Light, we. We got so little of Rin Marie, and that was one of my complaints about that book. So we get them together, and of course, I always love their interactions just in their own apartment and, you know, all of that. So we get some really great moments. And then that's like in the first. Really what. I'm just guessing, but like 10 to 15%, then we get like 60% of the book that falls into the pacing category that we're talking about where we get that. So we've got the A and the. As always, we've got an A and a B mystery or A and a B plot line. Right. So the A plot line is whatever this particular book is about, in this case, the A plot line or the monks and. And Brother Matthew having been murdered. And then we get the B plot line, which is everything having to do with Zhangui and Annie, Jean Gi and Armand, all of the. You know, that. And then Francoeur coming in and adding to all of that. That middle section, obviously, is the piece that. That really holds us up. And this time, knowing that going into this reading, I was really, really, really concentrated on getting into. Okay, what. But. But I know that there's some good stuff to be found here. And. And one of the things I did say to you is I do think that especially in the first 30%, there is some really beautiful Writing being done here. I mean, she's. Louise is always writing at a really high level. There really were some moments of beauty in this first bit that I absolutely loved. I loved the scene where they. Especially where they are coming. They arrive at the monastery. Okay, this is in chapter three. Beauvoir took it, and he's talking about the knocker. Beauvoir took it and hit the door with a mighty whack that made a sound. He hit it again and noticed the pock marks where others had hit and hit and hit. Zhangui looked behind him. The boatman raised his wrist and tapped his watch. Beauvoir turned back to the door and got a start. The wood had sprung eyes. The door was looking at them. Then he realized a slit had been opened and two bloodshot eyes looked out. If Beauvoir was surprised to see the eyes, the eyes seemed surprised to see him. I love that the wood had sprung eyes. I. I love that because it even this time sort of like, jarred me at that moment. Not very long after that, just two pages after that, they've entered the monastery and we get one of my favorite quotes. A long, wide corridor of gray stones opened up ahead of them, ending in a closed door at the far end. But what struck the chief, what must have struck every man, every monk who entered those doors for centuries, was the light. The corridor was filled with rainbows. Giddy prisms bouncing off the hard stone walls, pooling on the slate floors. They shifted and merged and separated as though alive. I really love some of the visuals that she's giving us in this first portion of the book as she's setting the stage at the monastery.
- [23:24]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah, I agree. I mean, I did give this book a 4.25 this time. Like, I'm talking about how stiflingly boring it was. But I did love everything she was doing there. I loved the writing. I love the atmosphere. She, you know, she was putting it together, like the. How she brought it to life, exactly, with that evocative writing. And then, you know, we. I like, as you have taught me, like, I like to judge a book on what the author is trying to do. And here I think she did strip it down. She did take away everything so that you could feel that silence. That was super heavy, right. Because they'd taken a vow of silence. You're in a monastery. And that tension and that sense of claustrophobia, right. And it becomes thicker and thicker. So, yes, it's boring because she wants it to be boring. She doesn't want to give you a lot of clues. She wants you to feel that kind of interpersonal tension kind of building and building and building until it kind of explodes. Right? And so at the beginning, the rainbows are there. It's really beautiful. They've come to this island where there's a shore. It's like this gem and like a secret in Quebec that no one knows about. Like, she doesn't start off kind of, you know, dark. Like, it's. So it's really interesting how she kind of descends into that. And I thought that writing was really, really beautiful too, Right.
- [24:46]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
So I think, you know, as we kind of think about pacing for this book, there's no question, from a plot perspective, this book is slow. I wouldn't even call it quiet for that middle 60%, it is just slow. But when. But if we can set aside. And I think this is where reread really comes into play, if we can set aside the plot movement element of things, there is a lot in this book to be delved into, and a lot of it. For me, the. One of the biggest things from a theme perspective that I took from this book that I really noticed in that middle 60% that I'd never noticed before. And it's interesting because you just said a word that is playing on this for me. She continues here to deal with issues of addiction, and it comes up over and over again in this story. Obviously, with everything that we're dealing with, with Zhangi, that's in the most obvious way, but there's these. She's layering these elements of addiction inside it that we are all capable or maybe all are addicted to something. So then people either are walking through their lives trying to get out of their addictions, or they're walking through their lives and they are embroiled in their addictions. Maybe they don't even know about it. So maybe for a lot of us, when our addiction is being busy or loading our lives up to the point where we can't sit in a place of silence because that silence makes us itchy. That silence makes us feel the places where we feel a gnawing ache, right? So maybe that's an addiction that. That we're dealing with. Certainly in 2025. I think that's an even more interesting lens to look at than it was in 2012. How much are we afraid of sitting in silence because of those elements of things? And then also she talks about, for a lot of these monks, maybe for all of them that are in this order, their addiction is the chance they are going and having these Physical experiences eight times a day that they are craving in a physical way. They are physically craving it. And so she brings up this issue of, are they there because this is their calling? Are they there because this is the purest way that they can worship God? Or are they there because they are addicted to these chants? And the silence in between them only increases that addiction and increases the hit of that addiction. So are they just a bunch of addicts sitting around together, feeding into their addiction? And then, of course, we also have what happens with Zhangi. And this is where we get to the word that you just used, because I really wanted to trace this with you, because I traced this through the entire book, Descent. And it's for Zhangi. He goes in to this whole investigation on a high. He's feeling really, really good. On a career perspective, he's feeling good. His body finally feels like it's healed. He's rehabbed and gotten on the other side of his pain medicine, medication, addiction. Of course, everything's going, you know, with. Going really well with Annie. They're excited about telling her parents. He's very, very excited and also subliminally extremely nervous about telling Ren? Marie and Armand because this is a very important moment for him. This is the moment where he might finally get the family element with Gamache that he's had in other ways. But this kind of makes it official.
- [28:36]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [28:36]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And so there's a lot at stake. But he also goes in on a high, and it's that, like, moment where he's on this high. And then early on, earlier than I realized, before that Descent starts. And it starts before Francoeur gets there.
- [28:52]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah. And it's funny because I think what leads to that Descent is a shift in perspective. It's not anything that actually happened. It's a change of perspective. And when I was looking at the Goodreads quotes that Louise had highlighted in this book, that was one of the key themes she pulled out. So she highlighted this quote for the first time. Gamache began to wonder if the garden existed on different planes. It was both a place of grass and earth and flowers, but also an allegory for that most private place inside each one of them. For some, it was a dark, locked room. For others, a garden. And Louise Penny herself says, again, the theme repeated in many of the books, but perhaps most profoundly in this one, of perspective, of what is inside, what is out, is the purpose of St Gilbert to keep the devout monks safe from the sins of the outside world, or the world safe from the monks, is It a garden or a wall, safety or a prison? Is the music a gift from God to be shared or a direct line to a higher power meant only for a chosen few? Right. Which is kind of the real kind of crux of this mystery. But even with Zhangi. Exactly. Before he. Before Franco, right. It's like. Like that key piece. Even in the end, does he believe Franco's perspective? Right. His truth or Gamache's truth? Even with Annie, he believes like he. That she loves him. And then remember, she start. He starts to question, oh, she's out with her friends. Is she making fun of me? Like, it's all these, you know, it's. It's his change in perspective there. It's the monk's change in perspective about whether this, the chance and becoming famous from the chance is a gift from God, an opportunity to share, or is it like a curse to them? Like so many of these things. And I thought exactly the same thing you did, Meredith. This book, even though it's not written from as personal place as the last one, it does feel like it's very personal, but with like a kind of an allegory over it. Like, it feels like Louise Penny has some experience here in addiction and perspective and how, you know, how, like that mindset of how you view the world and how that influences your actual. Around addiction and everything else. Right.
- [31:12]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And I think that that's a really, really important part of it that just. That the tenuousness, you know, that we can be in a really, really good place, but then there's this tenuousness that really small things can begin to shift that perspective, and then it can just build and build. And so this, you know, this time, by far, the. The biggest thing I took away from this book was. Was watching this shift, which goes from, you know, one of my favorite quotes early, early on, this is from Zhangi's perspective. He watched her place the lilacs in a vase on her kitchen table. So Annie's doing this and fluff them a bit, trying to arrange them. He'd stayed the night for the first time and woke in the morning to the suggestion of lilac and the realization that he had Annie's heart in his chest and she had his and would keep it safe. So, I mean, we're so like just in the throes of this new love, but one that is very, very deep. Right. And then so not very long after that, we have just on page 22, we have Jean Guy saying, thinking about when Armand and Ren Marie find out about their relationship he's thinking, suppose he isn't happy. The question snuck up on Beauvoir out of the woods. Suppose he doesn't want Annie to be with me. But that was, again, just fancy. Not fact. Not fact, not fact. And so my notes, I said, we're really seeing all of Beauvoir's insecurities and feelings of unworthiness as they be. They're swirling. Even in the midst of him feeling really, really good, those things are swirling there. Right. So then add to that the separation from, you know, he's. He's had to be separated from Annie at a time where he really wanted to be with her pretty much as much as possible. And their communication is. Is, you know, they can't communicate like normal. That's. That's frustrating. And then, of course, he's stuck in this silence. He's stuck in, you know, these. These monks aren't really doing anything. They're just doing the same things over and over again. And then, of course, at some point, we get what is the true evil. What I think, from this perspective of addiction being a recurring theme, the true evil that happens in this book, I would say, is not the murder of Brother Matthew in the garden in a moment of anger. The true evil that just rose the hackles on the back of my neck is everything that Francourt does, everything that he brings in, everything that he is doing very specifically with knowledge that he specifically gained to use in this way to come in and take a person who has healed himself physically and from an addiction, and to start unpicking that wound, unpicking the scab over and over again in the most evil ways possible. Watching Louise write Francoeur's actions as he works to draw Jean Guy back into his addiction and away from Armand is one of the most evil things I think happens in this, in the series, full stop.
- [34:47]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah, I completely agree. The way he psychologically dismantles Beaufort is just repugnant and so well written. But I will say before that, like, as you said, he enters into an environment that's ripe for that.
- [35:01]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right, right.
- [35:02]
Roxanna Kasimkara
And that's really interesting to me. Like, they're in God's house, Meredith. Right. Like, you've taken a recovering addiction, a man who has just has serious ptsd, Right. With Gamache, and is recovering from that. And then these monks who are supposed to be holy men, you've got them in, yeah, God's house, but it's kind of the worst place for them to be, you know, like. And I was reading this quote that Louise Penney had highlighted and what she wrote about it. I found this so interesting. So Gamache says. Gamache glanced through the leaded glass window. It made the world outside look slightly distorted, but still he yearned to step into it and stand in the sunshine, away even briefly, from this interior world of subtle glances and vague alliances of notes and veiled expressions. And Louise Penny says, here Armand is feeling oppressed and closed in. The peace he felt at first is dissipating as he discovers more and more about the interior life of the monastery and the monks, as he begins to see more clearly what is really happening and decode what the music really means to them. It's also an allusion to perception and how it is affected by where we stand. From the inside of St Gilbert, looking out, the world is warped. While to many on the outside looking at the life of these monks, their monastic life is warped, unhealthy, unnatural. And that's exactly like you've taken a poor recovering addict and. And you've put him in this place that's stifling, where he's alone with his own thoughts and he starts to unravel. And even Gamache, who has, you know, recovered to a good, you know, a good state and is very honest and open with himself, he's starting to have those feelings. And these monks are also, you know, may have been psychologically healthy, but they're in this place of where you think of vow of silence as, you know, as she said, like when he came and he felt comforted, you think it be a place of calm and, you know, knowing yourself, it's actually kind of become a poisonous environment. And into that Frank Kerr steps like, it couldn't be more perfectly set up for him. Right, right.
- [37:09]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And from a setting perspective, it is literally falling apart over them. Yes.
- [37:15]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah. Oh, I didn't even think about how the. Yeah. That part of the plot is exactly mirroring and like, echoing that.
- [37:21]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And the two walls, right. One wall looks fine and stable and supportive, but it's the other, other wall that is crumbling. It's the other one that we're not looking at. It's the interior wall that is crumbling and is going to take the entire building down around them, I think. And I. I was. I was going to say it's not just Beau that is being affected in this way. Both Zhangi and Gamache end up doing things within the bounds, within the walls of this monastery that are absolutely unthinkable. I mean, there are physical fights that are happening between them, not just between, you Know, of course we have that terrible. I mean, we'll talk about the ending scene, the end, the way that the ending is done. Because back to pacing. We get this kind of like happy first bit, a slow, aggressive 60% in the middle. And then we get this ending that is heart pounding. The last 15% of this book are everything that is fantastic about this series. Right. From a perspective of the characters, their development, what's happening between them, the actual plot, the resolution of the murder itself. It's a banger last 15%. Maybe one of the best endings of any book in the series.
- [38:38]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah, 100%.
- [38:39]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
So that is very, very interesting. But, you know, one of the things that I got this time from looking at this dissent, especially concentrating on Zhang Yi, is, is the slow way that. That that is being done. But it's very. Cons like that is paced really well throughout the story.
- [38:56]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [38:56]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
That she is just giving you. You know, we see him, you know, begin to have his insecurities. Like you said, maybe you're going out with other people. They're now all of a sudden he's thinking you're. They're laughing at me and you're laughing with them at me. And then where he's texting her and he's, you know, he's going back to saying, talk to you tomorrow, just with the letter U. And he had specifically said that, you know, he doesn't do that to her. He takes the time to type everything out because their relationship is important enough for that. But then here we get texts where he's going back to that. And I was just like, even just a little thing like that is just such a gut punch when you're like, you just see and you're like, junkie, don't do that. Like, don't do this. Your. Your perspective is complete. Your paranoia, your. Your perspective has been turned. And now when our perspective is turned, all of this stuff that we bring that is in those interior walls that is in there crumbling starts to be the full picture, starts to be the lens through which we're looking at everything. And that has happened to me in my own life.
- [40:03]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [40:03]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
You know, where all of a sudden I'm having these cracks in 2018. I've talked about this publicly. I cracked on the inside and then all of a sudden had a perspective shift and started to see the world through a totally different lens. That was completely untrue. But I was looking for every single bit of evidence that I could find to build up what I thought was that true perspective. I felt this Perspective shift. Because the last time I read this book was before my great unraveling in 2018, really, just a couple of months before. And so I read this completely differently, having come through the other side of that watch. I think this is why I keep coming back to this element of this book. I'm now realizing, talking to you right now, this is why this part of the book was so important to me. Because I have felt that happen where your rational mind knows X, Y and Z, but the cracks that are happening internally are shifting, shifting your perspective and distorting. Where once was a rainbow, a beautiful pooling prism of light is now something completely different that is throwing a spotlight on cracks and shadows and spidery things and ugly things and scary things, the scariest things. So I really read this book differently this time.
- [41:26]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Wow, that's so interesting. I hadn't even connected it to that Meredith, but I. I totally see that. I totally see that. I think. Yeah, as I said, I think Louise Penny was writing from a perspective of addiction and what she has been through and that shift in perspective. But I think, like you said it. I think it happens to all of us, right? It happens to Gamache here, not just John Guy, right? He enters this monastery as like, that calm, measured chief, but then his leadership is challenged. His authority is undermined. He sees Beauvoir unraveling.
- [41:58]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
He's doing everything he can to stop it, but he can't. Like, he's trying to get him out, but he can't get the plane, right?
- [42:04]
Roxanna Kasimkara
And he, like, he knows exactly. He knows what's happening. And he's. His temper is going because he's unraveling, right? And he's keeping it together. And. Well, he's trying to keep it together, but, you know, it's so.
- [42:16]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And guns are drawn. Guns are drawn.
- [42:19]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Guns are actually drawn. And. Yeah, and I felt the same thing. I remember when I was reading it, I was thinking exactly what you said. Like, I've had some heart events in my life lately, and I think I was telling you, like, I. A long time ago, I came upon this idea of the liberating hypothesis. And it was a rabbi who was talking about this, about when something happens and you don't know what the quote unquote truth is, you can choose. Choose a liberating hypothesis. Like, if you're going to gather evidence towards one thing, choose. Because it doesn't matter in the end what the truth is, and you're never going to know. So if you got fired, you can say you suck and you're no value. And you just, you know, and you'll collect evidence to that. Right. Which I can speak to personally or you can say this was not the right fit. There's something else for me, I'm. I'm. This is an opportunity to grow and you can collect evidence for that. But the doubt creeps in so easily that if you're not always mindful, that pulls you back. And frankly, even if you are mindful just that it's just there. It's like a. Like a rising tide. And at some point you just. Your hands go up because you can't fight it anymore. Right? So like as happens with Gamache and Zhangi, like Frankeur is that rising tide. Right. It's just a tsunami. Like there's no. There's no fighting that.
- [43:40]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. And I. And I. I think you're absolutely right. I think a really important part of what she's saying here, which is. I think this is one of the overarching themes of the. Of the series. Of course, we have the theme of light and dark that is played up here. We definitely see that here, even with the name of the monastery. But also this theme of. In large part, you know, we choose or the healthiest version of us when we are that healthy version. We are choosing to look at the world in a specific way. And we have all of these characters. Agent Nicole is a great example, right. Of this someone who. You can see how they are stuck in this perspective view of everything is against them. Everyone hates them. They are not good enough. They have to prove, you know, and you keep. When you're reading that book, you're thinking, but it. You don't need to be looking at life like this. Look at. Get that liberating perspective. Right. In every case up till now, that all of those characters have been very stuck in that view of the world. Right. This is the first time she tackles a character who. Maybe there is some fluidity to this state. Right?
- [44:58]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah. Yeah.
- [45:00]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
That you can. You can be in a good place. And then a perfect storm of cracks, which is what happens to Zhangi. A perfect storm. Okay, that's a bad metaphor. That's a mixed metaphor. He runs up against the perfect pothole that's exactly angled in the right way that all these circumstances come into play. Right. The question is, you know, and. And I did the same thing in. In my life in 2018. There was a perfect storm of things that happened that hadn't all come together before, but when they did, the cracks were just right. Tiboom right. In There. And in this. In this particular character, we're going to see that maybe there is a fluidity and a possibility that you can go in very deeply, in very, very damaging ways, because it is no joke what Zhangi is going through. By the time we get to the end of this story, he is now deeply back in his addiction. He has walked away physically, emotionally, in every flown. Walked in every possible way. She can separate them. She has. He's in a bad place at the end of the story. That's what makes it such a great cliffhanger. And also, she's doing something really different here than she's done with any other character, because, you know, we'll see that the. Doesn't need to stay this way. You can. You can have this kind of thing happen, which is, I think, what has happened to her in her life, to Louise Penny in her life, that she's been in this perfect storm of descent and perspective shift and then seen that there.
- [46:40]
Roxanna Kasimkara
It.
- [46:40]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
That is a trick of the light, and you can see that you can come back out of it. And so, yeah, I. I just found this. This element. But the other thing for me that came into play is I hadn't really seen from a plot perspective some of the ways that Francoeur came in with his. Because always it's so random that he come. That he's there.
- [47:03]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Like, why. Why so.
- [47:06]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. It's so random. The way that he flies in, of course, is a great. That's a great scene. Yeah, it's so random that he's there. It also plays on the fact that one of the things that's really different about this mystery, the murder itself, is that I really noticed this time, for the first 24 hours of this murder, they have very little, like, they have so little information about the murder itself. They don't have the autopsy results. They don't have the crime scene. Their whole group of crime scene techs around them finding different things and running different tests and do. They're really flying very blind in this. In this murder. And then, of course, one of the things that happens is Francoeur comes in with some of this really key information, and of course, he doesn't give it to them immediately. That is a huge betrayal. I mean, that's a sizable betrayal that he comes in and is not immediately saying, by the way, the murder weapon. You think that's. The murder weapon. Isn't. Here's what it is. That immediately shifts what they should be investigating. He holds it. Yeah, he's not there. He's not there to do anything that he purports to be there to do to help with this investigation. He's there to. With them.
- [48:12]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [48:13]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
To injure them, maybe even to. I mean, to resort to killing one or both of them in order to get. Solve the problem that he has.
- [48:22]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Well. And. Yeah. So there's a couple things about that. The first is, first I was struck by Gamache and Beauvar. Both have such significant character development here. Right. Such arcs. And Franke kind of feels like just the embodiment of evil, frankly. Right. Like, yes. He doesn't have any. There's no character development. And I'm not saying good. It has to be good. Like, that's not his point. But not even bad. He just is who he is. So I was thinking about that, and then I thought, like, does he develop or is he just, like, kind of playing the part of the villain? But then it's like, it feels like he's the embodiment of the corruption of the Sureite. Right. So he's not supposed to have any development. It's not that she has neglected development. It's that she's, you know. Yeah. He's like. He's this. You know, what Gamache always refers to is kind of like the evil he could never root out. He's the personification of that. He's the master manipulator. Right. It's. He's effortless in kind of bringing this evil to life. He understands the power dynamics and uses them to his advantage. His advantage. Right. And he's the one who's kind of puppeteered, continued to puppeteer this corruption in the Surete. So he's not like, he's supposed to be as evil as he is, and there's not supposed to be any And. And not appearing as evil, appearing as pleasant with his beautiful leather shoe and his, like, handsome, charismatic, pleasant, even. His tone, you know, he's always like. She's always saying, he came to cry. He said it casually, but there was something underneath that. And it's only when they're alone that he snarls like amash. Right. Otherwise, it's this perfect facade. So, like, I. I thought that was super interesting.
- [50:04]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yeah. And I thought, you know, he doesn't necessarily have. There is character development in him, but it. He is developing in the same way that the cracks are developing beneath the monastery. Like, to me, that's his development. It's just that he just gets worse and worse and the evil gets deeper and deeper and more and spread out further.
- [50:27]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [50:28]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Like that. To me, Is the develop. I mean, there's no. Like, he's not going to have a redemption story.
- [50:33]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [50:34]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
He's not going to develop as a person. He's developing only in the way that evil develops and seeps.
- [50:41]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Okay, so I have two thoughts on that. So the first is, I thought it was like, you know, in each of these books, Penny talks about how the murderer, you know, had something that festered and festered and then changed their perspective until they couldn't believe anything else. She always talks about that, and now it's like she's taken that of the murderer and she's put that into Gamache and into Beauvoir. Like you're saying. So you can see it's not just a murder that you know, because she'll say, well, that happened 20 years ago, but it's been festering this whole time. And now you can see how it can happen with anyone. And what's happened with the murders before is now happening with our main characters. And we see, just like you said, how easy it is for that descent. Right. To happen.
- [51:20]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. And then Frankur comes. Oh, go ahead.
- [51:23]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I was just going to say. And then the other thing is, like, okay, yes, Frank Kerr, completely evil, like you said, right. Those cracks in the foundation. But what really struck me here, the other evil, like, and I know you wouldn't call this evil, but those people that stand by and let the cracks happen. So, like, the abbot in this book, to me, Meredith just infuriated me, right? Like, we read all these books about nuns and, you know, convents, and what we love about them is, like, that leader that comes and, like, pulls them together and empowers them, and they do great things. And I'm looking at this abbot who finds out that his monks, the ones he's responsible for, right. He's the CEO in this case. He's the one leading the ship. They're all like, the monastery is cracking. It's going to fall apart. And what does he do? He orders the monk who told him not to tell anybody. Whether you feel that the chants are the right way out or not, the fact that you're just going to sit around and do nothing in the face of this to save the people that you are responsible for. Like, to your point, forget about not rising to the occasion. He descends, you know, and then. And I feel like, you know, that's mirrored in. Gamache knows he's not going to win against Francoeur, but he's not going to sit by and let it happen. He's responsible for his people, and he's going to stand up for them no matter what. And that just shows, like, the difference in their leadership and why we admire him so much and why we respect him so much. He stands up to the evil where others just kind of stand by.
- [52:53]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Absolutely. He's. That. He's. That. That place of good that is unshakable, unbreakable. Which is why when there are books, and this is not the only one where you. Where you see some of those cracks, some of that humanity in him, some of that goes back to, you know, one of the themes that's repeated. You know, I was. I was angry at him. I mean, this was the. The whole motivation for Luke to murder him. I was angry at him for being a man. I was. I was angry at him for being human in a lot of ways. I think Gamache, in a lot of ways that he sets up himself, is good to the point of it's almost unbelievable how good he is. But that only works because Penny is smart enough to build in these places where we see the. We see that cracks are possible with him.
- [53:40]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [53:41]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
So one of the quotes that stands out in my mind when we're talking about how we're seeing cracks in this relationship between Beauvoir and Gamache, the conduit that you were talking about, there's a place where Penny says there's plenty of time for a close friendship to turn to hate, as only a really good friendship could. The conduit to the heart was already created. So there's this element of, you know, you can hurt the people that you love because that. That conduit is already. Is already built there. And we see that as a part of Beauvoir's descent, where he. He's only capable of having these feelings of unworthiness and concern and, you know, insecurity, because he loves Gamache so much, which is why, you know, first Francour comes in and he. He comes in and he does a couple. A couple of things. He comes in and he starts to sow doubt. Right. He says that everyone sees that your only use is as Armand Gamache's puppy. They call you his bitch because while you growl and sometimes bite, they don't think that you actually have balls. And then here. Here was a piece, Roxanna, that I missed before, but this time I was like. It was a light bulb moment, but, like the prologue, this might be something that you were. You were. You were privy to the entire time. I always thought it was random, that scene where Francoeur is in the abbot's office, and Zhangi is alone. And he hears him. He hears voices, but he can't figure out. He's like, but he couldn't be talking to anyone because there's no. And we go in, and he. And Francour shuts the laptop down, and they have this interplay. And then Francoeur leaves. And at that point, it's like late at night, Junkie has a few minutes alone. He looks. And what he had heard was that Francoeur was watching the raid, which Penny says the raid had been captured on the cameras attached to the agent's headgear. And later, months later, it had been hacked and edited and released onto the Internet. Beauvoir had become addicted to that video as he had to painkillers, they were two halves of a whole. First the pain, then the killers, over and over and over until it had become his life watching his friends die over and over and over. My aha. Moment here was that a. Francoeur had been playing that video to draw Zhang Gi into watching it purposefully, because Francoeur had learned that piece of. Of him watching the video and then taking the painkillers. And that. That was like a really big. Those two pieces were a part of his addiction. Francoeur realized, from accessing the transcripts of his therapy sessions, Zhangi's therapy sessions he had, which is already like the one of another betrayal, right? Another step beyond normal that Francoeur has taken. And he realizes, aha, I'm not just going to be able to walk up to him and go, here, take this painkiller. I have to trigger him. I have to trigger him with the video. I have to get him to watch this video. That is what is going to make him susceptible to taking the painkillers. And only then will I firmly have him stepped away from. Because then certainly Gamache won't want him to be with his daughter because he'll be using again. And so then, of course, Gamache will say, I can't be for this relationship. And then, of course, that. That removes from Zhang Gi that which has become the most important part of his life. He takes everything from Zhangi. He's in the most calculated way, taking piece by piece, every single thing from him. I hadn't put that together about the video before reading it this time.
- [57:40]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I didn't get that either, actually, until you said it. Like, I did wonder, like, why was he playing that video? Because why did he have it there? And then John Key says, you're the one who released it. And he says, no, I was watching it because I wanted to find out who the killer was. And you're like, no, that's. So why is he playing that video? So, okay, right now I get it.
- [57:59]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
At the end, there's a scene where Gamache is confronting him and saying, you're using what he said to his therapist against him. And so we realized that that's where he's gotten all of this. And it was. That piece of the video is what truly breaks Zhang Gi apart. Without that video, I don't think Zhangi would have. The video is what restarts the pain.
- [58:27]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Well, because he's watched the video all those times, and all those times, again, it's that perspective. He's watched it and thought, this is where Gamache leaves me. This is where he leaves me. He doesn't care about me. And you see, when he's recovering, he says, no. Like, that was where Gamache kissed him on the forehead. Because that's the part he'd always ignored. Right. He's like, no, he kissed me on the forehead. He goes to get the others. He loves me. And then when, you know, Francoeur introduces it again, it's like, oh, he leaves me. It's that change of perspective. Change again. He's just hammering that in. It's like taking off that old scab. You're trying to build a new. That liberating hypothesis, but then somebody shoves you back into that old thinking, and then. Exactly. You're right. Then it's his pattern of, okay, take a pill, and then he freaking gives him the pills.
- [59:19]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right. And that's the kill shot.
- [59:21]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yes. With the note from the. You know, the medicine. So that he thinks that they're. You know, whether he's. To himself, he can lie conveniently and say, these are from the doctor. Like, you know that. Like, what kind of evil is that.
- [59:36]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Meredith, to the premeditation. The premeditation of that evil, I think, is more evil, scarier, to know that it is possible for someone to be that evil than many of the murders that have been in this series up to now.
- [59:55]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah, I totally agree. Because there is one thing to shoot somebody or kill them and leave them for dead. There's another thing to psychologically dismantle a person piece by piece into a brutal well of suffering. Right. And take joy in their life. Yeah. And not even do that because you hate the person. You do that because you hate another person. And you're willing to sacrifice this person, like the first person, for that hatred, for that revenge. It's not even that he hate John Key. He couldn't care less about John G. He does it to get to Gamache. Like, that's evil, Meredith.
- [60:31]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And when you think about why he hates Gamache, that even more spirals inside to this, almost like. It's almost like the story of Satan. Like, and. And what? You know, like why Satan turned against God. And, you know, all of this where it's like he hates Frankur, hates Gamache, because he is everything that. That he knows is good and right, and yet everything that Francoeur can't see in himself, like it's his own level of self. I mean, there are other reasons that he. That he hates him, but what it boils down to is he ha. Everything that Gmech represents and how it makes him feel his own unworthiness. There is nothing so dangerous on this planet than a white man's unworthiness.
- [61:17]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I've heard that before. Whew. That's powerful.
- [61:21]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
So there's a lot that I think we could say about this book being flawed from a perspective of its plot and, like, just enjoyment of reading a mystery novel. Like, of course nobody in their right mind should pick up this book in a vacuum. Oh, my gosh. If anyone ever just started with this book, they'd be like, I don't care about what's going on here, and I have no idea what the. Is happening here with these two guys. And that what the heck is happening?
- [61:51]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Which is why when people are like, oh, no, you can enter anywhere in the series.
- [61:54]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
It's exactly.
- [61:56]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Come on. I'm a marketer, and I get what you're trying to do and get people in, but even I will say, that's complete hogwash. It's like saying, you know what? You know, the Mona Lisa. If you just focus on a piece of her shoulder, it's just. It's fine. Then you can look at a piece of her eye. Then maybe like, no. And I'm not trying to compare Louise Penny to Mona Lisa, but she has created a body of work that builds upon each other. So you can't just enter in the middle and think, you know, if I read this by itself, I would probably give it a 2. As it is, I was giving it a 4.25. I might just raise that, Meredith, after our talk. I know, because I'm just, like, really so masterful.
- [62:34]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
But it's my third time through it, and I'm. You know what I mean? And I'm. I'm just at this point beginning to say, I mean, I've Again, let's talk a little bit about the ending. There are a lot of moments that I remember about this series that are just gutting. There are two that are in my top two. One we haven't gotten to yet, but this one is just one of the two most gutting moments in the entire series. That whole last scene where she's going back. Penny is taking us back and forth between getting the resolution of the plot, a murder, the. The, you know, who actually killed fair Matthew, and then she's going back and forth in, I think, a really well constructed way where those two pieces of momentum are building on each other. And of course, we're getting, you know, these moments where that. That fight, that physical fight where Zhangi is clawing at Gamache for the pill bottle like a wild animal. It's so hard to conceive of the two of them fighting like this and, like, hurting each other. I mean, that's. That moment is really gutting. And then, of course, the moment where he flies, where he flies away and where he just won't, where Gamache is looking up, trying so hard to see him and get eye contact with Zhangi, and Zhangi just turns away, and then she just leaves us right there.
- [64:03]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah.
- [64:04]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
It's brutal ending.
- [64:07]
Roxanna Kasimkara
It's. And then even when Gamache goes to thank her and, you know, Zhangi's right there and he almost. He's like, I could just push a little bit harder on his windpipe and he would be gone. And, you know, you've never seen Gamache at the brink, but when he realizes the extent of Frank, her evil and what he's done, and the part I had to stop, like, you know, when I was texting you, I literally was. I had to stop every three minutes because I was like, I can't breathe. Like, after, like, there's the pill thing, like, reaching for the pill, that was the most intense. And then. Yes. And then Gamache going for Franco, and then Franker and Gamache giving Zhang Gi their alternative versions of the truth, you know, and then him having to choose. And then that last line where he goes to Gamache, if I go with you, will you still make me go into rehab? And, you know, Gamache is like, he's a one, but he's an enneagram. Like, he's got a two wing, right? So that just means, like, he really wants to take care of, like, his son, really. And he has to say, yeah, I will, because that's what's best for you. And then he has to let Zhang Ki make his choice. Right.
- [65:19]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
And I just steps in that moment when Zhangi steps away.
- [65:23]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Right. And Franke is like, he just doesn't trust you. He doesn't think you're powerful. He's just playing. You're another. You're his puppy again. You know, if you were with me, I believe you're powerful. Here, take these pills. You think I care? I know you could survive with them or without them anyway, all that. And you're just like, oh, it's just breaking you apart.
- [65:43]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
When they're in the plane and he throws the bottle of pills and he's like, here, this is for you.
- [65:49]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Oh, my God.
- [65:49]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
He might have just as well handed him a loaded gun.
- [65:52]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Yeah. I mean, that would have been more humane, frankly, than this. And just that scene where. Yeah. Where Gamache says that, and it made me think of. You're going to tell me the name of this book, the one called Let Them by the. Who's this powerful speaker?
- [66:05]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Mel Robbins.
- [66:05]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Mel Robbins, right. And her whole theory of, look, in the end, you've got to let them, you know, let them do whatever and let me do this. And that is such a powerful. Like dealing with an addict. But in the end, saying or anyone, anyone in your life, but drawing the boundaries of, look, I'm going to do what's right. So do I want you to come with me? More than anything, do I want to save you from this guy more than life itself. But I'm still going to do the right thing by you if you come with me. And I'm not going to lie to you about it. Right. He could have done a lot of things. He could have said, I'll take you, and then, no, I won't do that. And then lie. Like, he could have done many things, but he's Gamache, so he did what was right. And.
- [66:46]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yeah, but it didn't know it was.
- [66:48]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Hard, even though it was hard, and it didn't result like in every other book, it's resulted in the right thing happening, and it didn't. And your heart breaks for Gamache, your heart breaks for Zhangi, and you just. You're left in this desolate place, which is where she wanted to leave you. But it is. It's one of the most powerful endings in this series and one of the most powerful endings I've ever read.
- [67:09]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yeah. And, you know, it's become common knowledge that the latest book, the Gray Wolf, ends on a cliffhanger. But it's interesting that that one has gotten so much kind of pushback because of the way. Because it ends the plot. It ends plot A on a cliffhanger, whereas in the other books there's multiple where. Where plot B ends on a cliffhanger. And I think we've come to expect that. All right, so let's talk a little bit. Was there any Canadian point of view that you think is especially interesting for us to talk about with this book?
- [67:38]
Roxanna Kasimkara
So I'm glad you asked that, Meredith, because when I was reading about Saint Gibert entre les Loup, Penny always bases something in reality. So I was like, where does this come from? And it was, in fact, draw drawing inspiration from a real place. So there is a Saint Benoit du Lac, which is a Benedictine monastery in Quebec, and it's known for its Gregorian chanting. And it's along Lake Mafre Magog, which is, you know, again, an isolated, beautiful, kind of idyllic setting. And so what happens in the book obviously has nothing to do with this monastery, and it's a Benedictine monastery because she realized, she says in a quote, you know, it became clear in researching this book that I couldn't set the book in a monastery or even an order that really existed, of course. So I dug into history and found the Gilbertines, an order that actually once existed, but went extinct. So I did look up. I was like, I need to see what this monastery looks like. Oh, my God, Meredith, it's stunning. And they do have that, like, hallway that you see the monk who's wearing the hood go through with the light. You don't see the rainbows, but you see the light. And I was like, oh, it would just help me afterwards to kind of bring it to life. They have a whole video and they even have a guest house, though I'm not sure I would want to stay in that guest house after reading this book.
- [68:57]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right.
- [68:58]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Even though it has nothing to do with this book. I'd be like, are the foundations cracking?
- [69:02]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Where?
- [69:02]
Roxanna Kasimkara
You know, are these monks evil?
- [69:03]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
I don't.
- [69:04]
Roxanna Kasimkara
I don't know what's going on.
- [69:05]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yeah, exactly. But it is really worth. I think it does add quite a bit to the reading of the novel to look that up and we'll include that link in the show notes. And also to listen either a little bit or a lot to some Gregorian chants. I think that. That I did that a little bit as I did my reading of this book. On two flights, I was flying back and forth to San Diego, and so it was two, three hour flights. And each time I devoted all of the flight to doing this reading, which is when I get some of my best reading done. But I would start out each flight listening to some Gregorian chants just to kind of set the mood, because I really do feel like. I mean, you can get that kind of. It's almost. I mean, what we think of now is like, ASMR kind of does some of that same thing. You can get that kind of tingly, you know, feeling from hearing some of those chants, and then it gets you into the reading of the book. But certainly, yes, and there are some beautiful pictures of that monastery, including that one almost. That one where you see the hallway and you see the monk. Like, anytime I see, like, hooded figures really kind of creep me out a little bit, like. Or just kind of give me a feeling. And so there's. That picture is a really, really good one. So I'm glad. I'm glad that you brought that up. Well, let's kind of bring our conversation to a close here by talking about some of the things we talk about for each book, which is. What would you say? What's your favorite scene of the book?
- [70:31]
Roxanna Kasimkara
So my favorite scene. I mean, favorite is hard here, but I will say that last scene is just the most powerful. When John Key has to make a decision, I just couldn't choose another one. There's, you know, there's some lovely ones that happen with the chanting and, you know, at the monk's table, but those all pale in comparison to that last scene. It's so powerful. And now that I've read it again, it's going to stick me with me all through the series.
- [70:56]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yeah, that last 10%. 10, 15%. I mean, that. There's just no question, no question. Who is your character mvp?
- [71:04]
Roxanna Kasimkara
So I would say my character MVP here is. You know, I'm trying not to do the obvious. So I was thinking it was Frere Simon, and as I said, it took me a while to. To kind of pull apart who the monks were, but he was, like, a really interesting contrast to the other monks. You know, he's one of the few who seems genuinely devoted to monastic life and into the ideals of, you know, where he's living rather than trapped by it or addicted to the chance. He has these quiet observations and moments of reflection that kind of add depth. And, you know, they. They really kind of show what it's like for, like, a true monk showing his faith and devotion. And it offers, like, a nice contrast to, you know, all the other corruption going on. Right. So I thought it was. I thought he was an Interesting character.
- [71:53]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yes. I mean, and I am going to go very obvious here, but for me, my character MVP has to go to Zhangi here. Not. I mean, only because this is a book where his character gets so fleshed out. We are so in his head. We get to know him so well. It's not fun what we find out, but it's very. There's just such a humanity here. We. This, to me, this book is just the one where we're just, like, Zhang Ki could step off the page and into this room with me, and I would know exactly everything I needed to know about him. So I just. I love the writing about that character in this particular book. Who's your biggest loser?
- [72:36]
Roxanna Kasimkara
You know, I said it before, it's that abbot. Like, I understand him wanting to keep the chance sacred. I think whichever way you lean on that, whether you think it's a gift from God to be shared or not, you know, you can have a principled stance on that. But to see your abbey literally crumbling and your monk's futures being jeopardized and not to do anything and not to raise a warning flag and not even, frankly, to have a plan was just infuriating to me. To not take responsibility really bothers me. So he was. Oh, he was the biggest loser to me. I was so mad with that character. Like, he has all these pithy insights and, you know, he quotes, you know, the testaments and stuff, but in the end, like, he doesn't do the right thing.
- [73:18]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
All he does is pray, and he gets his miracle in the end. But, man, right? I mean, for sure, he. He was definitely, I think, the person who loses the biggest in this. I mean, not only, of course, you know, there's. There's big losses that Gamache and. And Beauvoir are having at the end of this. But poor Annie.
- [73:36]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Oh, poor Annie.
- [73:38]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Like, 48 hours ago, things were looking good, and now this is what's coming back. So, you know, she loses big time here. We don't have a lot of great food descriptions in this book.
- [73:51]
Roxanna Kasimkara
No. And I, you know, I would have thought just for the sake of lightness, she maybe would have put some in because they're in this monastery. They have the chocolate blueberries. There's Monk, help us out. Yeah, right? There's, like, a couple, but they're, like, eating bread and cheese. It's fine. You know, but, like, when you look at even the real monastery, they make wine and they make cheese, and I just feel like there could have been a little bit of warmth there, but There wasn't a lot of, you know, I looked at a couple and was like, yeah, it's fine. That's was really not her focus here. I think it was the anti village mystery. She was like, no, I'm not putting any of that in.
- [74:24]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
I'm not. Yes. I'm not going to give you a single cafe au lait. I'm not going to give you. Yeah, the chocolate blueberries. I loved it that they started out having one monk doing the chocolate blueberries, and then they had to switch it so that two monks were on every shift because otherwise they would just, you know. So that. That was really. Those blueberries gave us some moments of lightness. Okay, so not a lot of great food description, but there were some really, really great quotes. My favorite quote is one that really gets to the heart of the music element of things. And for me, because I'm not a music person, sometimes I need some help to figure out why it has such an effect on people. So I loved this. This is Gamache. After a minute or so of silence, Gamache heard a sound. It seemed quite far off, and he wondered if a plane was approaching. Again, it was a haunting sort of hum. Then he realized it wasn't coming from outside at all, but inside, the sound was coming from Fresimon. What started as a drone, a hum, a note hanging in the air, turned into something else. With a swoop. The note descended and seemed to play in the lower registers before leaping back up. Not a jagged leap, but a soft soar. It seemed to sweep into Gamache's chest and surround his heart and then take it along for the ride. Higher and higher, but never precipitous, never dangerous. Never did Gamache feel the music or his heart were about to come crashing down. I think that's a beautiful description of the way that music can make someone feel.
- [75:59]
Roxanna Kasimkara
You can tell that Louise Penny loves music by the way she describes in this book. And, you know, we talked a little bit about it, but we really do. Like, by book eight, we're taking it for granted. This woman is just a masterful writer. Like, if you read that in any other book, you would be like, oh my God, look at this fabulous author. And we still think that. But I think you're right to call attention to the. To the. The sentence level writing and how impeccable it is through this whole book. It really is stunning.
- [76:27]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right? No matter what else she's doing, she finds ways to make the sentence level prose just. You know, even in this book, I found her doing a lot of repeating, like she'd say over and over and over. Or that one. That one quote. Not fact, not fact, not fact. It's kind of gets to this chant. She's kind of adding some of the chanting elements and so well done. What was your favorite quote?
- [76:49]
Roxanna Kasimkara
So my favorite quote is at the end of the book, and it's a bit long, but bear with me because I think it's really important for this book, but also for this series. So it starts. Gamache watched the plane until it disappeared from sight. Then he turned to the abbot, who just joined him. I know how horrendous this has been for you, for all of us, the abbot agreed. I hope we learn from it. Gamache paused. And what's the lesson? The abbot thought about that for a few moments. Do you know why we're called St Gilbert Entreleux? Why our emblem is two wolves intertwined? Gamache shook his head. I assumed it dated back to when the first monks arrived, that is, that it was symbolic of taming the wilderness or making friends with it. Something like that. You're right. It is from when Don Clement and the others came here, said the abbot. It's a story one of the Montagniers told them. A native story? Asked Gamache, surprised the old Gilbertines were inspired by anything they'd have considered pagan. Dom Clement relates it in his diaries. One of the elders told him that when he was a boy, his grandfather came to him one day and said that he had two wolves fighting inside of him. One was gray, the other black. The gray one wanted his father to be courageous and patient and kind. The other, the black one, wanted his father to be fearful and cruel. This upset the boy, and he thought about it for a few days, then returned to the grandfather. He asked Grandfather, which of the wolves will win? The abbot smiled slightly and examined the Chief inspector. Do you know what his grandfather said? Gamache shook his head. There was a look of such sadness on the chief inspector's face, it almost broke the abbot's heart. The one I feed, said Don Philippe. Gamache looked back at the monastery that would now stand for many generations to come. St Gilbert entre Lelue. He'd mistranslated it. Not St Gilbert among the wolves, but between them, in that place of perpetual choice. And as you said, Meredith, this comes up again, obviously, with the latest one. But that idea of the perspective I embrace the one I feed, you know, it's such a powerful idea. It reminded me of like Dumbledore telling Harry, you know, it's our choices that make us Harry, you know, not our destinies. Like, it's that idea of choosing, like, your choices, making you over and over again. I just thought it was so powerful.
- [79:02]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it really. It is. And the fact that she's brought this forward with the Gray Wolf, and then coming later this year, the Black Wolf and the. The monastery and the monks come back again. They come into play again. And so this was a really wonderful reread for me right now, just having read the Gray Wolf. I know you haven't read that one yet, but it's very interesting the way that she's so masterful at the way that she's intertwined these stories from back in book eight all the way up to books 19 and 20, which is just really, really incredible. Well, that is a wonderful place for us to leave off our discussion of A beautiful mystery by Louise. Penny, we are so glad that you joined us. As you guys know, it's been my dream for so long to spend time talking deeply about these books. It's such a delight to do it. And Roxanna, it's such a delight to do it with you.
- [79:59]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Meredith, I love doing this with you. Every time I think, well, we have enough to say. And here we are at an hour 28. Yes, we have enough to say.
- [80:08]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
We always do.
- [80:10]
Roxanna Kasimkara
We hope you enjoyed our conversation about a beautiful mystery and all things Three Pines. We'll drop the next episode in A Journey to Three Pines, where we'll be focusing on book nine, how the light gets in in a few months. And we hope you'll join us. And I will say for all of you that maybe struggled through book eight, you have to get to book nine. That one is so powerful. It is not in a monastery. And let me just tell you, it is such the best payoff. I won't say any more, but please, please do keep reading because that next book is really a banger.
- [80:45]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Right? Louise knows how to put us through it and how to reward us for sure. All right, if you want more bookish content, join us every Monday for the Currently Reading podcast where Katie Cobb and I and our show regulars talk about the books that we are currently reading and we tell you exactly what we thought about them. You can find our show at Currently Reading Podcast on Instagram. I'm Meredith Monday Schwartz on Instagram and Katie, my co host, is at Notes.
- [81:13]
Roxanna Kasimkara
On Bookmarks, and you can find me @roxannethereader on Instagram.
- [81:17]
Meredith Monday Schwartz
Thank you so much for reading this fantastic series along with us. We are so happy that you're listening. We'll see you next time on a journey to Three Pines. Happy reading, Roxanna.
- [81:29]
Roxanna Kasimkara
Happy reading. Meredith.