The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau

Framed as a translation of a lost French work from 1982, British author Burnet’s entertaining first novel works best as a Simenon-influenced deconstruction of a crime story and as a character study of the two men caught up in the titular disappearance. Manfred Baumann, a lonely and quiet man, is the last person to see Adèle Bedeau alive in the small French town of Saint-Louis, and between that fact and his obsession with her, he naturally becomes a suspect in the crime. Insp. Georges Gorski is still smarting over a case from years ago that he believes resulted in the wrong person being convicted, and he’s unaware that he’s not only right but that Baumann was the real culprit. The guilt Baumann feels over the crime he actually committed clashes with his desire not to be accused of making Adèle vanish. The result is less a cat-and-mouse game than an examination of two men dealing with their respective guilt, but the wit that Burnet (whose second novel, His Bloody Project made the Man Booker shortlist) brings to the table keeps the story from becoming ponderous. (Oct.)