Death In The Truffle Wood - Tapa blanda

"The atmosphere is as earthy as the truffles from which Banon makes a living, though Magnan cuts the richness with humour" (Guardian)

"Magnan's stylish narrative is enlivened by touches of sometimes grim humour" (Sunday Telegraph)

"Entertaining and intriguing. A canny exercise in black humour and suspense" (Time Out)

"Highly entertaining" (Good Book Guide)

"'Witty and melancholy by turns, if the plot of this eccentric tale of greed and witchcraft doesn't have your mouth watering, the loving descriptions of French food will" (Daily Telegraph)

In Banon, a small, peaceful village in upper Provence, the local community's principal source of income is the cultivation of truffles. Outsiders rarely venture to this remote region, but a small group of society's drop-outs have chosen to set up home on the outskirts of the village, and trouble ensues.

When one of them is found dead in the freezer of a local hotel, and when a further five bodies are discovered drained of blood in a family vault in the cemetery, it takes all Commissaire Laviolette's considerable resources to unravel crimes that have been committed in a climate of age-old superstition and secret animosity.

Not since Jean Giono has any writer been able to capture the authentic flavour, spirit and traditions of Provence.