Maigret and the Headless Corpse (Penguin Modern Classics – Crime & Espionage)

‘The new crime and espionage series from Penguin Classics makes for a mouth-watering prospect’ Daily Telegraph

Penguin Books is reviving the iconic Penguin Modern Classics ‘Crime and Espionage’ series, first published 75 years ago. Featuring John le Carré, Georges Simenon, Josephine Tey, Edogawa Rampo and more, these iconic paperbacks celebrate the endless variety and unique appeal of one of fiction’s greatest genres.

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A baffling case. A mysterious inheritance.

It starts when a man’s arm is fished out of Paris’s Canal Saint-Martin. Then the rest of the body is retrieved – apart from the head. Inspector Maigret is determined to unearth the truth behind this disturbing murder. When he meets the strangely taciturn owner of a shabby local bistro, Madame Calas, who says her husband is away, the pieces start to fall into place. But, as the dogged, laconic detective discovers, nothing in this tangled case is as it seems.

Georges Simenon was born in Liège, Belgium, in 1903. He is best known in Britain as the author of the Maigret novels and his prolific output of over 400 novels and short stories have made him a household name in continental Europe. He died in 1989 in Lausanne, Switzerland, where he had lived for the latter part of his life.