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Henri Castang #14
You Who Know
Henri Castang finds police investigation dangerous when an old friend and Irish bureaucrat is shotgunned, but his wife gets the answers by pursuing questions his police-cohorts would never think to ask.
185 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1994
About the author
Nicolas Freeling
89 books60 followersNicolas Freeling born Nicolas Davidson, (March 3, 1927 - July 20, 2003) was a British crime novelist, best known as the author of the Van der Valk series of detective novels which were adapted for transmission on the British ITV network by Thames Television during the 1970s.
Freeling was born in London, but travelled widely, and ended his life at his long-standing home at Grandfontaine to the west of Strasbourg. He had followed a variety of occupations, including the armed services and the catering profession. He began writing during a three-week prison sentence, after being convicted of stealing some food.[citation needed]
Freeling's The King of the Rainy Country received a 1967 Edgar Award, from the Mystery Writers of America, for Best Novel. He also won the Gold Dagger of the Crime Writers' Association, and France's Grand Prix de Littérature Policière.
From Wikipedia
Series:
* Van Der Valk
* Henri Castang
Freeling was born in London, but travelled widely, and ended his life at his long-standing home at Grandfontaine to the west of Strasbourg. He had followed a variety of occupations, including the armed services and the catering profession. He began writing during a three-week prison sentence, after being convicted of stealing some food.[citation needed]
Freeling's The King of the Rainy Country received a 1967 Edgar Award, from the Mystery Writers of America, for Best Novel. He also won the Gold Dagger of the Crime Writers' Association, and France's Grand Prix de Littérature Policière.
From Wikipedia
Series:
* Van Der Valk
* Henri Castang
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 28, 2025
Wonderful Detective Crime Novel.
Freeling has a glorious command of the English language. His characters are richly drawn and amazingly real. The dialogue is superb and pulls you into the depths of their being.
Freeling has a glorious command of the English language. His characters are richly drawn and amazingly real. The dialogue is superb and pulls you into the depths of their being.
July 11, 2023
This one has style, a strong mystery plot, good if quirky writing — it's Freeling at the top of his form in an early 1990s period when his work could be hit and miss. Former French police officer and now obscure European Community legal bureaucrat Henri Castang plunges into a semi-official investigation of a colleague's brutal murder. He turns up many interesting things, including a chillingly amoral and well concealed bad guy at the bottom of things. Some nicely done descriptions of southeastern Ireland and the Italian-Swiss border area are provided along the way. The denouement, however, is sentimentalized and highly unlikely, with events shaped to support the overall point Freeling wants to make.
Of course, there are the usual Freeling elements to either accept or reject. Most of the characters have the same sophisticated and often elliptical speech patterns. The third-person narrative is interrupted for a few pages by a first-person reminiscence by Castang. The book is full of literary and musical cultural references, some well known and others more obscure; they reflect Freeling's interests and opinions, and the heck with an average reader's background knowledge and opinions. There are quite odd and questionable comments about what shows through some women's clothing and about the nature of women overall. In fact, it's quite possible to believe that for Freeling, this story was more about women than about the crimes. This suspicion is doubled when someone tells Castang that he has a feminine quality that helps make him a good detective. That doesn't mean he is always a pleasant or even likable character.
Of course, there are the usual Freeling elements to either accept or reject. Most of the characters have the same sophisticated and often elliptical speech patterns. The third-person narrative is interrupted for a few pages by a first-person reminiscence by Castang. The book is full of literary and musical cultural references, some well known and others more obscure; they reflect Freeling's interests and opinions, and the heck with an average reader's background knowledge and opinions. There are quite odd and questionable comments about what shows through some women's clothing and about the nature of women overall. In fact, it's quite possible to believe that for Freeling, this story was more about women than about the crimes. This suspicion is doubled when someone tells Castang that he has a feminine quality that helps make him a good detective. That doesn't mean he is always a pleasant or even likable character.
July 23, 2015
"Voi che sapete che cosa ė amor" is the title of Cherubino's aria from Mozart's "Le Nozze di Figaro". You who know what love is. Nicolas Freeling's titles - as quirky as they are - make perfect sense. "You Who Know" (1994) is a surprise - almost a regular thriller! And it is a good one plus we get the usual great, unmistakably Freelingesque, idiosyncratic writing. We even have a stream-of-consciousness fragment (transpiring on a Deutsche Autobahn, of all places). It is the fourteenth novel in the series featuring Henri Castang, a high-ranking French police commissaire, now serving as a Brussels bureaucrat.
Castang's friend, an Irish diplomat also employed by the European Community, has been shot and the commissaire is sent on an unofficial mission to cast light on the killing and - which is obvious but cleverly left unsaid - to make sure no political undercurrents can be found. Castang and his wife, Vera, travel to make inquiries in Ireland, in England, and in Lugano area, in the Swiss - Italian Alps. I am not one to appreciate plot a lot, but here we have a Whole Lotta Plot.
The Grand Finale is spoken rather than acted, so mercifully there are no silly final action scenes! Instead we have an Aristotelian catharsis - "a certain emotional cleansing of the spectator". Great job (particularly if one does not like formulaic, paint-by-numbers thrillers)!
Four stars.
Castang's friend, an Irish diplomat also employed by the European Community, has been shot and the commissaire is sent on an unofficial mission to cast light on the killing and - which is obvious but cleverly left unsaid - to make sure no political undercurrents can be found. Castang and his wife, Vera, travel to make inquiries in Ireland, in England, and in Lugano area, in the Swiss - Italian Alps. I am not one to appreciate plot a lot, but here we have a Whole Lotta Plot.
The Grand Finale is spoken rather than acted, so mercifully there are no silly final action scenes! Instead we have an Aristotelian catharsis - "a certain emotional cleansing of the spectator". Great job (particularly if one does not like formulaic, paint-by-numbers thrillers)!
Four stars.
August 30, 2010
Didn't finish this one - I eventually disliked the protagonist Castang too much to continue on.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews