A review by furfff
Félicie by Georges Simenon

2.0

Not a favorite in the series for me, especially disappointing since it's got a great opening section of Maigret having a real sensory experience (and for the rest of his lifetime memory) of walking down the street.
But then the rest of the book gets trapped in the much more trivial, with an obsession with a person who's not even legitimately a suspect (although she is guilty of being a thoroughly charmless character that we have to endure). We end up feeling like maigret himself havlway through in that he "has the feeling that the damned job he has chosen to do makes him live other people's lives instead of quietly living his own." You would think that's a pretty obvious statement about a lead inspector character in a mystery series, but the pleasure for me is the luxuriously slow add of shade to Maigret himself and those around him... his wife, his best friend, those who report to him, etc. The suspects are usually an entertaining side-story catalyst to that for me, but in this case, Felicie (the book and the character) is only largely irritating.