Occupied Paris, 1944. The swastika flies from the top of the Eiffel Tower, Nazi officers patrol the elegant boulevards and the once-vibrant city is shrouded in suspicion and fear. At a chic Right Bank address, a ghastly pile of dismembered bodies is discovered. Even in these sinister times, the crime scene is amongst the most harrowing veteran detective Georges Massu has ever seen. The property's owner, well-to-do Dr Marcel Petiot, immediately becomes the number-one suspect, but he has vanished without a trace. As the police delve into the doctor's past, they uncover a disturbing history of violence and corruption. Drugs, theft, links to the criminal underworld and a string of missing women: for Massu, it seems like a cut-and-dry case. But as the manhunt intensifies and all of Paris clamours for the latest news, the investigation leads the police to Gestapo files detailing Petiot's involvement in the city's secret escape network. Is Massu pursuing a sadistic serial killer or a hero of the Resistance? Who are Petiot's victims? In this fascinating true account of a case that gripped wartime Paris, David King draws extensively on new sources, including previously classified French files, to paint a chilling portrait of a murderer whose crimes devastated a city already in the grip of evil.
| ISBN: | 9780751548457 |
| Publication date: | 21st June 2012 |
| Author: | David King |
| Publisher: | "Sphere an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group" |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Pagination: | 432 pages |
| Primary Genre | Crime and Mystery |
| Recommendations: |
Occupied Paris, 1944. The swastika flies from the top of the Eiffel Tower, Nazi officers patrol the elegant boulevards and the once-vibrant city is shrouded in suspicion and fear. At a chic Right Bank address, a ghastly pile of dismembered bodies is discovered. Even in these sinister times, the crime scene is amongst the most harrowing veteran detective Georges Massu has ever seen. The property's owner, well-to-do Dr Marcel Petiot, immediately becomes the number-one suspect, but he has vanished without a trace. As the police delve into the doctor's past, they uncover a disturbing history of violence and corruption. Drugs, theft, links to the criminal underworld and a string of missing women: for Massu, it seems like a cut-and-dry case. But as the manhunt intensifies and all of Paris clamours for the latest news, the investigation leads the police to Gestapo files detailing Petiot's involvement in the city's secret escape network. Is Massu pursuing a sadistic serial killer or a hero of the Resistance? Who are Petiot's victims? In this fascinating true account of a case that gripped wartime Paris, David King draws extensively on new sources, including previously classified French files, to paint a chilling portrait of a murderer whose crimes devastated a city already in the grip of evil.
Death in the City of Light The True Story of the Serial Killer Who Terrorised Wartime Paris features in the following genres: Crime and Mystery, Non-Fiction Books of the Month, eBooks of the Month, Fiction, Recommendations
Death in the City of Light The True Story of the Serial Killer Who Terrorised Wartime Paris is available in Paperback
Death in the City of Light The True Story of the Serial Killer Who Terrorised Wartime Paris was written by David King and published by "Sphere an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group"
Death in the City of Light The True Story of the Serial Killer Who Terrorised Wartime Paris has 432 pages