The Black Tower

Book excerpt: A “delicious” historical mystery featuring a Paris detective and master of disguise by the author of The Pale Blue Eye (Entertainment Weekly). Chief of a newly created plainclothes police force, Vidocq is a man whose name sends terror rippling through the Parisian underworld of 1818—and the inconsequential life of Hector Carpentier is violently shaken when Vidocq storms into it. A former medical student living in his mother’s Latin Quarter boardinghouse, Hector finds himself dragged into a dangerous mystery surrounding the fate of the dauphin, the ten-year-old son of King Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette presumed to have suffered a cruel death years earlier in Paris’s dreaded Temple. But the truth of what happened may be even more shocking—and it will fall to an aimless young man and the most feared detective in Paris to see justice done for a frightened little boy in a black tower . . . no matter what the cost. Inspired by the colorful real-life detective who became legendary in his native France, The Black Tower showcases “all the narrative verve and sly wit—both plot twists and turns of phrase—that make [Bayard’s] books such a pleasure to read” (The Washington Post). “Bayard reinvigorates historical fiction, rendering the nineteenth century as if he’d witnessed it firsthand.” —The New York Times Book Review “A writer of historical thrillers in the vein of Caleb Carr, author of The Alienist, and nineteenth-century writers such as Alexandre Dumas, author of The Count of Monte Cristo.” —The Wall Street Journal “Stellar . . . Few writers today can match the author’s skill in devising an intelligent thriller with heart.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)