The Case of Lisandra P.

November 16, 2015
When psychoanalyst Vittorio Puig is arrested for the murder of his lissome young wife, Lisandra, his longtime patient Eva Maria Darienzo agrees to pursue her own inquiries—never suspecting the danger into which she’s plunging—in this diabolic danse macabre set in Buenos Aires in 1987 from Grémillon (The Confidant). Though she has no investigative background, Eva Maria, a volcanologist who began therapy because of crippling depression after her grown daughter became one of Argentina’s desaparecidos, has learned harsh lessons about duplicity, cruelty, and betrayal during the junta’s reign and its aftermath. More ugly truths await as she throws herself into unravelling the mystery of Lisandra, in large part by listening to secret tapes of Dr. Puig’s sessions with other patients, and she discovers that almost nothing is as it seems. Though Grémillon occasionally gets swept away with some characters’ obsessive musings, for the most part she spins a cunningly plotted tale that is by turns cerebral, suspenseful—and ultimately shocking.

October 15, 2015
When a psychoanalyst's wife is murdered, one of his patients is so determined to prove his innocence that she becomes entwined in the case herself in this Argentina-set psychological thriller. In 1987 Buenos Aires, the young wife of a prominent psychoanalyst plummets to her death from their sixth-floor apartment. Vittorio and Lisandra Puig's relationship wasn't always the most loving, and he's soon arrested for her murder, much to the shock of Eva Maria Darienzo, one of his longtime patients. Gremillon (The Confidant, 2012) seamlessly weaves in Argentina's bloody political history as Eva Maria grapples with the disappearance and murder of her daughter, Stella, five years earlier, presumed to be one of the desaparecidos killed during the country's "dirty war." Eva Maria begins her own unofficial investigation after Vittorio directs her to a secret stash of cassette tapes in his office, recordings of all his patients. As she listens to the sessions, which Gremillon expertly captures with the perfect mix of clinical specificity and voyeurism, Eva Maria becomes convinced that each successive patient--Alicia the despondent divorcee; Felipe the ex-junta wife-beater; even Miguel the musician, whose passion for the piano was beaten out of him during the war--could be Lisandra's killer. Vittorio is equally convinced of their innocence, and the reader is soon unsure whom to trust, particularly after it's revealed that Eva Maria turns to alcohol for comfort, much to the consternation of her surviving child, Esteban. One thing is clear, though it does not help narrow down a perpetrator: infidelity and jealously have poisoned Vittorio and Lisandra's union. Full of truly unexpected twists and poignant turns, Gremillon's subtly political drama reverberates long after the killer is unmasked.

COPYRIGHT(2015) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

February 1, 2016

This novel of sudden death and its consequences from Gremillon (The Confidant) might be considered a murder mystery, but the story is much more than that. In 1987, lovely young Lisandra is found dead on the street in front of her apartment building in Buenos Aires. Who pushed her out the sixth-floor window? When her husband, a psychoanalyst named Vittorio, is arrested for her murder, his devoted patient Eva Maria resolves to help clear his name. Eva Maria seeks solace in drinking; she is still reeling from the disappearance of her daughter, Stella, during the evil years of the military junta in Argentina. But Eva Maria soon gets more than she bargained for. Gremillon's breathless prose captures the frantic state of Eva Maria's mind and, in flashbacks, the desperation of poor Lisandra. VERDICT This tense novel of both the personal and the political touches on the ugly truth of a brutal regime while also examining jealousy and betrayal, with disturbing twists and turns. Readers hoping for a satisfying conclusion with justice duly served may find Lisandra's story too dark for their taste.--Leslie Patterson, Rehoboth, MA

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 1, 2015
Set in 1987 Buenos Aires, this complex psychological mystery explores the atmosphere of suspicion and fear following Argentina's Dirty War. Psychoanalyst Vittorio Puig is arrested after his wife, Lisandra, plummets to her death from the couple's sixth-floor window. The police are convinced that Vittorio murdered his beautiful wife in a jealous rage. It fits the evidence: Vittorio's unconfirmed alibi, signs of struggle within the apartment, and a busybody neighbor's account of the couple's fighting. Vittorio suspects that the murderer is one of his patients, and he convinces adoring patient Eva Marie to transcribe secret recordings of his sessions. Through these transcriptions, an obsessive mother, a military torturer, and a musician tortured and widowed by the violent regime all emerge as possible killers. At the same time, Eva Marie, herself struggling with her daughter's murder by the junta, begins to piece together a new vision of Vittorio, her seemingly unimpeachable savior. Gremillon makes good use of the period's fear-laden atmosphere, masking the novel's central tragedy behind Buenos Aires' widespread paranoia and the dark insights emerging from Vittorio's tapes.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)