The Enzo Files Series by Peter May

What has happened to Jacques Gaillard? The brilliant teacher who trained some of Frances best and brightest at the École Nationale d'Administration vanished ten years ago. The mystery inspires a bet, one that Scottish biologist Enzo Macleod can ill afford to lose. The wager is that Enzo can find out what happened to Jacques Gaillard by applying new science to an old case. (This book was originally titled "Dry Bones".)

Gil Petty, the worlds number one wine critic, went missing during a tasting tour of the little-known wine region of Gaillac. Four years ago, his body was discovered strung up on a cross in the vineyards of southwest France.

Enzo MacLeod, a Scot teaching on a faculty at Cahors in southwest France, confidently bet that he could use his expertise to crack seven notorious murders described in a book on cold cases by Parisian journalist Roger Raffin. Enzo has in fact solved the first two crimes... moreEnzo MacLeod, a Scot teaching on a faculty at Cahors in southwest France, confidently bet that he could use his expertise to crack seven notorious murders described in a book on cold cases by Parisian journalist Roger Raffin. Enzo has in fact solved the first two crimes.But the third is far from his mind right now: he’s just been diagnosed with a terminal illness, and he’s become the victim of someone who seems intent on destroying his credit and his relationships—and getting him arrested for murder. This is one instance where his Scottish stubbornness might pay off.Having established a safe house to protect his loved ones, besieged now as it were, he sets to work. Are his personal woes somehow connected to the digging he’s done into the brutal murder of a rent boy in a Paris apartment sixteen years ago, as Raffin has described? What further remnants of evidence can he review—and can he stay alive long enough to catch the long-hidden killer? This is the third installment in the Enzo MacLeod series. less

A promise made to a dying man leads forensics ace Enzo Macleod, a Scot who's been teaching in France for many years, to the study which the man's heir has preserved for nearly twenty years. The dead man left several clues there designed to reveal the killer's identity to the man's son, but ironically the son died soon after the father... moreA promise made to a dying man leads forensics ace Enzo Macleod, a Scot who's been teaching in France for many years, to the study which the man's heir has preserved for nearly twenty years. The dead man left several clues there designed to reveal the killer's identity to the man's son, but ironically the son died soon after the father. So begins the fourth of seven cold cases written up in a bestselling book by Parisian journalist Roger Raffin that Enzo rashly boasted he could solve (he's been successful with the first three). It takes Enzo to a tiny island off the coast of Brittany in France, where he must confront the hostility of locals who have no desire to see the infamous murder back in the headlines. An attractive widow, a man charged but acquitted of the murder--but still the viable suspect, a crime scene frozen in time, a dangerous hell hole by the cliffs, and a collection of impenetrable messages, make this one of Enzo's most difficult cases. less

When France's top chef, Marc Fraysse, summoned the world's press to make a shattering announcement, rumors abounded that he was about to lose one of his three coveted Michelin stars.  Instead, on arrival at his remote restaurant on a volcanic plateau in central France, they were greeted with the news that the troubled genius had been murdered, and the message he intended to deliver was never made.  Seven years on, the identity of his killer also remains an enigma... moreWhen France's top chef, Marc Fraysse, summoned the world's press to make a shattering announcement, rumors abounded that he was about to lose one of his three coveted Michelin stars.  Instead, on arrival at his remote restaurant on a volcanic plateau in central France, they were greeted with the news that the troubled genius had been murdered, and the message he intended to deliver was never made.  Seven years on, the identity of his killer also remains an enigma.   Enzo Macleod takes on his fifth cold case and delves into the big business and high stakes of French haute cuisine.  As winter sets in, and snow gathers along a volcanic horizon, he retraces long cold footsteps across a remote hilltop.  But unravelling the complex web of relationships that surrounded the brilliant and mercurial chef - a spurned lover, a jealous wife, an estranged brother, an embittered food critic--also leads to strange parallels with his own life.  And in opening up this celebrated cold case, he finds himself reopening old wounds from his past. less

Unabridged AudiobookNarrated by Peter ForbesWest of France, 1989.A weeping killer deposits the unconscious body of nineteen year old Lucie Martin, her head wrapped in a blue plastic bag, into the water of a picturesque lake.Lot-et-Garonne, 2003.Fourteen years later a summer heatwave parches the earth, killing trees and bushes and drying out streams. In the scorched mud and desiccated slime of the lake a fisherman finds a skeleton wearing a bag over its skull.Paris, October 2011... moreUnabridged AudiobookNarrated by Peter ForbesWest of France, 1989.A weeping killer deposits the unconscious body of nineteen year old Lucie Martin, her head wrapped in a blue plastic bag, into the water of a picturesque lake.Lot-et-Garonne, 2003.Fourteen years later a summer heatwave parches the earth, killing trees and bushes and drying out streams. In the scorched mud and desiccated slime of the lake a fisherman finds a skeleton wearing a bag over its skull.Paris, October 2011.In an elegant apartment in Paris, forensic expert Enzo Macleod pores over the scant evidence of this, the sixth cold case he has been challenged to solve. In taking on this old and seemingly impossible task he will put everything and everyone he holds dear in a peril he could never have imagined. less

In a sleepy French village, the body of a man shot through the head is disinterred by the roots of a fallen tree. A week later a famous art critic is viciously murdered in a nearby house. The deaths occurred more than seventy years apart. Asked by a colleague to inspect the site of the former, forensics expert Enzo Macleod quickly finds himself embroiled in the investigation of the latter... moreIn a sleepy French village, the body of a man shot through the head is disinterred by the roots of a fallen tree. A week later a famous art critic is viciously murdered in a nearby house. The deaths occurred more than seventy years apart. Asked by a colleague to inspect the site of the former, forensics expert Enzo Macleod quickly finds himself embroiled in the investigation of the latter. Two extraordinary narratives are set in train - one historical, unfolding in the treacherous wartime years of Occupied France; the other contemporary, set in the autumn of 2020 as France re-enters Covid lockdown.And Enzo's investigations reveal an unexpected link between the murders -the Mona Lisa.Tasked by the exiled General C harles de Gaulle to keep the world's most famous painting out of Nazi hands after the fall of France in 1940, 28-year-old Georgette Pignal finds herself swept along by the tide of history. Following in the wake of Da Vinci's Mona Lisa as it is moved from château to château by the Louvre, she finds herself just one step ahead of two German art experts sent to steal it for rival patrons - Hitler and Göring.What none of them know is that the Louvre itself has taken exceptional measures to keep the painting safe, unwittingly setting in train a fatal sequence of events extending over seven decades. Events that have led to both killings.The Night Gate spans three generations, taking us from war-torn London, the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, Berlin and Vichy France, to the deadly enemy facing the world in 2020. In his latest novel, Peter May shows why he is one of the great contemporary writers of crime fiction. less