The King of the Rainy Country

by Nicolas Freeling, 1965

This was a Christie book-of-the-day calendar recommendation. I liked it but it mentioned many things, people, ideas, and places I had never heard of, I would have spent too much time looking things up. I didn’t look anything up so I only understood enough to keep up.

It was about a very rich man disappearing and is told from the perspective of the police detective hired to find him. It was set in Europe: Amsterdam, Germany, Austrian ski resorts, Spain. The rich man and a young German girl are eventually found and they have committed suicide. Then, the rich man’s wife tries to kill the police detective and then shoots herself. Maybe if I had understood even one-half of the many different things he wrote about, it would have been better.

Here’s an example:

A thin, elegant floor waiter–like all floor waiters he looked a great deal more distinguished than the guests–was wheeling out a cart. There was a tinkle of silver and porcelain, a smell of hot chocolate–Mme de Sevigne–a whiff of aftershave–Yardley–and over all that indefinable hotel smell of old carpets. Mr. Canisius, cosseted and comfortable, was breaking bread on his little balcony, in a nervous-looking way, as though a paper snake on a spring might suddenly come whizzing out. Van der Valk, who had noticed that all foreigners in France do this–probably frightened of getting crumbs on the carpet–thought of Raymond Chandler, who described himself as being, yes, extremely tough, even known to have broken a Vienna roll with his bare hands.

See, just too many ideas in one paragraph that I don’t know anything about, and there were many paragraphs like that. Still, it was interesting, and I wanted to keep reading. Just disappointing that two of the main characters committed suicide, though.

Here is how the book-a-day calendar described this book:

Cosmopolitan Crime

A prolific and highly regarded mystery writer of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, Nicolas Freeling created two intriguing series that are well worth seeking out. The first featured the Dutch inspector Piet Van der Valk, the second, French detective Henri Castang. Start at the top with Freeling’s 1967 Edgar Award winner, The King of the Rainy Country, in which Van der Valk scrambles all over Europe in pursuit of a mysterious businessman. Sophisticated, urbane, thoughtful, Freeling’s novels are elegant, atmospheric entertainments.