Murder on the Ile Saint-Louis [Large Print] [Paperback]

"And when she opened it, she saw the child, and behold, the baby wept. So she had compassion on him, and said, 'This is one of the Hebrews' children.'" -- Exodus 2:6

As the book begins, Aimee receives a telephone call from an unknown woman that leads Aimee to an unattended baby girl in a courtyard. Naturally, Aimee picks up the baby and takes her home. Aimee assumes that the mother will soon return and avoid calling the French social services people. Her attachment to "Stella" soon grows.

Few can see an abandoned baby and not want to help. I'm fortunate that way because one of my grandmothers was adopted after being a foundling.

Cara Black draws on that rich emotional context to craft this story about Aimee Leduc's fictional neighborhood on the Ile Saint-Louis in Paris. It's well done.

This complication also means that Aimee has to provide and to arrange for child care during her investigations. She's almost like a regular working mother here. These details add another connection to reality that makes the story more appealing.

Can you think of another recent mystery series based in Paris that provides such rich detail about a neighborhood, its history, its current inhabitants, the lives of those on society's margins, and intriguing looks at a quartier's underground quirks? Anyone who has read more than two books in the series is bound to have found that combination to be intriguing.

I suspect that some people discover Cara Black in the mistaken belief that she provides for Paris what Donna Leon does for Venice. Mais, non! Ms. Leon takes you into the places that tourists would like to go while Ms. Black takes you to places that many tourists probably pray they will never see.

There's also an intriguing choice of detectives by Cara Black that breaks the mold. Her heroine, Aimee Leduc, doesn't want to be an investigator. She just wants to wear vintage designer clothes bought for little, to have exciting times with handsome "bad" boys, and to earn enough money as a computer security consultant at Leduc Detective to keep her home and business. Her pain is not understanding what happened to her mother and father, an intriguing thread that ties the series together. Rene Friant, her partner, is a genius at hacking into computer systems and is an expert in martial arts despite being a dwarf who walks in pain.

The weakness of this story is found in an improbable plot development around petroleum exploration and production and danger to the environment. It's too bad. A better plot device would have worked just as well in supporting the main theme of finding Stella's mother (an echo of Aimee's own search for her missing mother).