День праха

Jean-Christophe Grange is a recognized master of the European detective story, whose great literary fame began with the thriller “Crimson Rivers” (1998), which was soon brilliantly filmed. The main character, brilliantly played by Jean Reno, the taciturn policeman Pierre Nieman, who has a corrosive analytical mind, but a quarrelsome character, immediately fell in love with the audience. And twenty years later, Granger decided to resurrect the legendary commissioner in the novel “The Last Hunt” and the new thriller “Day of Ashes.” Under the rubble of a fresco that collapsed from the vault of an ancient chapel in Alsace, the body of a man was found. The chapel has long belonged to a religious community, whose representatives call themselves Messengers of the Lord. In fact, this is a closed sect, living according to its own laws, going back to the depths of time. They shun modern gadgets and other achievements of civilization, dress like they did in the eighteenth century, pray, grow grapes and make wine, which is famous throughout Europe. The deceased was one of the leaders of the community. However, the police have doubts that his death is the result of an accident. Pierre Nieman and his young assistant Ivana Bogdanovich are included in the investigation. And while Nieman, with the help of local gendarmes, is looking for evidence, Ivana infiltrates the ranks of day laborers in order to take a closer look at the strange community from the inside during the grape harvest. Meanwhile, the situation is heating up, new victims appear. But the search for the killer will not move forward until investigators answer the questions: where did the piece of coal come from in the deceased’s mouth and what do the hidden frescoes discovered under the paintings of the vault of the gloomy chapel mean? For the first time in Russian.