Clara Simpson

In Tourtoirac, Périgord, Isabelle Maurin, newly crowned Queen of Araucania, is found decapitated in the château she had just inherited. Emma Lambert, a young police lieutenant from Bordeaux, joins Sacha Besson, a local gendarme, to investigate. Emma, a transgender woman, conceals that she is the daughter of Julie Dupuy, the village doctor and mayor, with whom relations soured after her transition. As more murders point to the contested legacy of the 19th-century Kingdom of Araucania, Emma and Sacha must navigate a tangle of hidden identities, buried secrets, and dangerous ambitions—while confronting their own growing attraction.

Estelle is a psychiatrist dedicated to her profession, a fervent practitioner of Ericksonian hypnosis, who leads an almost peaceful life with her husband and son. But her life is turned upside down the day Thomas, her first love, reappears in her life, hospitalized in her department following a suicide attempt. He is soon accused of killing a doctor, Estelle’s rival. Estelle then flees with Thomas to the Provençal countryside to try to clear his name and treat him. Her husband David and her best friend Agathe, while investigating to find them before the authorities, discover Thomas’s very troubled personality and suspect him of being a threat to Estelle. It is in this chase that the secrets binding Estelle and Thomas finally resurface…

A death in the family leads to an interesting meal for the mourners.