A Journey to Three Pines - Episode 4: A Rule Against Murder
Currently Reading
Meredith Schwartz
4.7 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 15 December 2023
⏱️ 94 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
We are so excited to journey with you to Three Pines, the fictional French-Canadian village created by Louise Penny for her Three Pines series, featuring Armand Gamache. This spin-off podcast series will tackle each of the books in the series in turn, in a spoiler-FILLED format. Be sure you’ve read the book before listening to the episode.
As you’ve come to expect with all Currently Reading content, Meredith and Roxanna will follow a regular episode format, with regular segments, so you know what to expect each and every time. We love staying focused on the book, rather than conversational rabbit holes.
Show notes for this series will not be time-stamped except for broad sections, but will include links to Bookshop dot org or Amazon for any books or resources referenced in the episode.
2:40 - Putting the Book Into Context
A Rule Against Murder by Louise Penny
Publication date (2009)
4.21 rating on Goodreads
Seasonal setting - Summer
Book Awards: Crimewriters of Canada Award for Excellence in 2009
Critic Reviews
Alternate Title: The Murder Stone
Meredith’s and Roxanna’s encounters with the book
9:25 - The Setup
8:46 - A Deeper Exploration
Setup and first paragraph
Perfect prologue - sets us up for Manoir Bellechasse, but then chapter 1 goes back to Three Pines shortly
An entire family of characters we as readers cannot really root for
Mic drop moments
Flimsy mystery, great building of suspense
The pacing of the novel
Quality of writing itself - last major action scene
Themes: Rest, oppressive heat, paradise lost, prisons, things being unnatural, bravery in vulnerability
The Cruelest Month by Louise Penny
Still Life by Louise Penny
Character Development - Gamache’s misstep
57:08 - What Do We Need to Know?
History within the book as it pertains to reality
The Oddness Factor
1:07:11 - Superlatives
Biggest Flaw
Favorite Quote
Character MVP
Biggest loser
Best food description
1:22:37 - Within the Series
Is this book skippable?
Setting the foundation
1:23:34 - SPOILERS AHEAD HERE
Easter eggs to future books
Next episode’s read: The Brutal Telling by Louise Penny
No Spoilers this episode!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | And the Welcome to a journey to Three Pines. In this special limited edition series from the currently reading podcast, we're doing a deep exploration of each book in Louise Penny's Three Pines mystery series. |
| 0:29.6 | And I mean it when I say we're diving deep. |
| 0:33.2 | We'll delve into the mysteries of course, |
| 0:35.1 | but we'll also talk about the characters we love so much, |
| 0:38.2 | the delightful village of Three Pines, |
| 0:40.2 | or other locales, and probably even chat about all the delicious meals they feast on, |
| 0:45.3 | washed down with a bowl of Café O'Lé. |
| 0:47.3 | We'll discuss everything from the themes, Penny Explores, to why we love Armand-Gamash and all the rest so very much. I'm Meredith |
| 0:55.6 | Monday Schwartz co-host of the currently reading podcast and the Three Pine |
| 0:59.7 | series is my favorite book series of all time. |
| 1:02.6 | And I'm Roxanna Kasam Kara, a Canadian reader and show regular on the currently reading podcast. |
| 1:07.8 | I'm making my way through the series and loving it. |
| 1:10.6 | In today's episode, we'll focus on a rule against murder, the fourth in the series. |
| 1:15.2 | And yes, this series must absolutely must be read in order. |
| 1:20.0 | We should say at the very top of the show that this podcast series is for people who have read the book that we're diving into. |
| 1:27.0 | There will be spoilers about a rule against murder, which is also sold as the Murderstone. |
| 1:33.0 | So if you haven't read it yet, you may want to press pause and come back when you've got that reading in. |
| 1:38.0 | We will also be discussing each book in context of the series as a whole, but we'll save those conversations |
| 1:45.0 | for the end of each episode and we'll tell you when that is going to happen. |
| 1:49.0 | All right, as we mentioned, Roxanna, this is our fourth episode. We are on the fourth book and this to me is when things really start rock and rolling. |
| 1:59.6 | But first of all, I want to check and see. how are you feeling this week? |
| 2:03.0 | Thank you so much Meredith. This episode is a little bit late because I was fouled by a terrible cold for the first time in a couple of years and just didn't have my voice for a couple of weeks but I am much better now still a little bit |
... |
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