My Review: The Last Mandarin is a bit of a “six impossible things before breakfast” kind of story. Then again, our perspective on the frequently insane events of this tale is named Alice - and she often doesn’t believe what’s happening either, even while she’s in the midst of experiencing it. Especially while she’s experiencing it. The story begins with food blogger Alice Li in the restaurant of one of Washington D.C.’s premier hotels, watching resentfully as seemingly everyone in the room sidles up to the table to pay homage to her mother Vivien.

My Review: This book begins in the exact same place where the previous book, The Grey Wolf, ends. With the same characters, even with the same sentence, at the moment in time where the situation changes irrevocably. The moment, as artist Clara Morrow's current series of paintings is currently stuck on, the moment just before something happened. It begins in the village of Three Pines, in the Gamache living room, where the Sûreté du Québec’s Homicide Chief, Armand Gamache, is recovering from his barely averted execution at what should have been the successful conclusion of his latest investigation.