From Bruges with Love

by Pieter Aspe

                When a young girl discovers a skeleton on the property her family is renovating, Asst. Commissioner Pieter Van In is charged with finding out who buried the body decades ago. As Van In looks for records of the previous property owners for a clue to the skeleton’s identity, he finds a disturbing history of prostitution, drugs and pedophilia going back decades involving some very important government officials. When he is cautioned to proceed carefully, Van In chooses to do the opposite, and in the process almost costs a young female police officer her life.

            This is the third of Aspe’s Pieter Van In series to be translated to English. The book is filled with a cast of quirky characters, however it takes a while for this book to really take off and become interesting. Part of the problem in my opinion is with the translation. There are so many characters whose last name begins with a V that it is difficult to differentiate who is who in the book. Add to this the fact that the average English reader is not familiar with Belgian names and it becomes tedious to remember which ‘V’ character is which. At one point, I made a cheat sheet list of which V character was which.

            For all its translation issues, this is still a very good book. The characters are flawed, misguided, and truly evil; but they are believable. Bruges with Love builds slowly and steadily in intensity until it captures the reader. With a couple of wonderful twists at the end, it’s a worthwhile read.

            I look forward to more of this author’s works. Hopefully the translation issues will become less pronounced with each new book.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review.