DIE AROUND SUNDOWN

A French detective helps the Nazis find a killer.

Even under the heel of the German occupiers, there’s plenty of crime in Paris, as Princess Marie Bonaparte, great-grandniece of the emperor himself, learns when she finds her fashionable home ransacked and her servants dead. Police detective Henri Lefort impresses her with his quick wit, which saves her from immediate danger. But much as Henri wants to stay and solve the case for the princess, Roger Langeron, chief of all the police in Paris, has other priorities. Sturmbannführer Jung has asked Lefort and no one else to investigate the death of Hauptman Walter Fischer, the German officer charged with cataloging the Louvre’s vast treasures and reassigning them to new homes in Axis-friendly countries. Jung gives Lefort a list of suspects and one week to crack the case, promising that he’ll repay failure with unspecified penalties Lefort can only imagine. From this edgy premise, Pryor spins a tale increasingly complex. Nicola, Lefort’s assistant, finds a Picasso drawing hidden in the dead man’s clothing. Marie Bonaparte, a trained psychoanalyst, bribes Lefort to engage in sessions with her in order to probe his pathological aversion to noise. A reporter shadows Lefort, revealing unexpected news. Suspects produce alibis provided by Picasso himself. The identity of Fischer’s murderer is perhaps the least surprising of the many twists and turns this tale of love, hate, and misophonia has on offer.

Wheels within wheels power this homage to battles waged without and within.