Fate Accompli: Murder in Quebec City

Publication: Summer 2018, Bayeux Arts, www.bayeux.com

COMMENTS

In Fate Accompli, Miriam Clavir has accomplished that rarity in the genre: a mystery novel that is both a mystery and a novel. Careful, intelligent writing, a wonderfully complex character, and a plot that draws the reader to its unforeseen conclusion. Unputdownable!

Wayne Grady, author of Emancipation Day

A modern and deadly web of human relationships is revealed during an archaeological dig in historic Quebec City. The Golden Dog, a 17th century legend of revenge, becomes its inescapable backdrop. Fate Accompli is a riveting story and a metaphor for the important things in life.

Gisèle Piédalue, archaeologist, Terrasse Dufferin

Miriam possède une écriture fine avec un sens du détail qui confirme sa grande connaissance du milieu muséal. Dès les premières pages, nous sommes happés par cette intrigue hors des sentiers battus.

Miriam writes with fine-tuned perception and has a deft way with details that reflect her profound knowledge of the museum environment. From the very first pages, the reader is caught up in this highly original plot.

Maureen Martineau, author, Quebec mystery novel series

BOOK CLUB DISCUSSIONS:  click to view

THE NOVEL

Bérénice ‘Berry’ Cates is caught up in the potent history of Quebec’s major cultural communities. The delicate balance of her life comes apart when, working as an artifacts conservator on an archaeological dig unearthing the history of Lower Town, she finds the corpse of a famous local historian, a frequent visitor to the excavation. Berry is doubly vulnerable, swept up as well in being a “newbie”—new job, new profession, new city, new love—and, at fifty-four, understanding age and loss.

Just as Berry is coming to terms with discovering first-hand the death of a man she admired, a frightful second murder sears her and her amour Daniel Tremblay even more deeply. Cognizant of both sides of Quebec City’s ancient stone inscription of the Golden Dog, Berry gathers information while, like the dog, she waits for her moment of revenge, when she can “bite him who has bitten me”. But it is instead Berry who is tricked and “bitten” until she devises a way to bring the killer to justice. In doing so, Berry must also act in ways she can live with for the rest of her life, her own personal “je me souviens” (“I remember”, the motto of Quebec).

AVAILABLE FROM

Available for purchase from Bayeux Arts, many independent bookstores, Amazon.ca (or internationally, the Amazon website that best serves your country), and Indigo/Chapters.

Fait Accompli cover pictureJF Fred Granzow, Designer