Aristide Pamplemousse, formerly of the Suret, is now an undercover restaurant-reviewer for Le Guide, and his current assignment is the renowned Hotel-Restaurant La Lagoustine in St. Castille. Soon, however, Pamplemousse is distracted from the super cuisine by escalating mayhem. He's served a nasty plastic head instead of Poularde de Bresse en Vessie Royale. Someone peppers his leg with a shotgun-blast, tries to run him down with a car, etc. The Mafia? But why? Or are the attacks really aimed, perhaps, at another hotel guest? (There's a wealthy, unfortunate young man with two hooks instead of hands--who fears that he's the real victim.) The mystery isn't really important as I read for the crazy escapades he gets himself into and love the perspective that Pommes Frites provides. Pample-mousse foolishly pretends to be a man with two wooden legs; he is virtually raped by the hotelier's wife, who's into sandpaper; he escapes her clutches with help from an inflatable, wooden-legged male sex-doll, and he temporarily loses doggie-sidekick Pommes Frites. We briefly meet Pamplemousse's wife as she is carted away by a crane that removes the gazebo she was lounging on, Pommes Frites on the pursuit.
I love Monsieur Pamplemouse and have read this book several times but every time I find something fresh and it always makes me laugh out loud. I was so excited to see a new book in the series that came out in 2010!