Lionel Destremau, itinerary of two little killers – Liberation

Find on this page all the news of the thriller and the books that caught the eye of Liberty. And subscribe to the Libe Polar newsletter By clicking here.

In this novel, everything is almost true and almost false. There are press extracts from Small newspaperof Morning or Republican Lyonbetween 1903 and 1933. But also weather reports which evoke rainy summers and harsh winters at -20 ° in the countryside. And then we meet this tattooed man, Louis Rambert, and his accomplice, Gustave Mailly, installed in the Lyon region, on the side of Saint-Didier-au-Mont-d’Or, Villeurbanne or Ecully. Little by little, Lionel Destremau is more precise, describing the childhood of these two poor fellows, at the time of the war of 1914, then their youth of thugs who play the grounds for young prostitutes, drink too much, sleep in gourbis, work as a ragpic. They go through all the small trades and show a certain art of resourceful. The author has no equal in describing this miteuse atmosphere that smells of bad wine, prison for small thefts, daily violence and drunk fights. Louis Rambert likes tattoos and gradually his skin tells his story, that of a guy who will end badly.

We approach the drama. One day, these two will commit an ignoble crime with a hammer on two old people who are not even rich. The hazardous accomplices plunge into a bloodbath because they imagined their future covered with gold coins that do not exist. A real trial takes place and the press talks about it. One ends in his cell, plagued by the disease, the other is embarked on a rafiot for Saint-Jean-du-Maroni, in the prison of Guyana.

They are not really remarkable these guys by little but Lionel Destremau knows subtly describing their sinuous journey and above all, the life of an environment, of a universe without light. Thanks to the author, the duo becomes fascinating as the criminal gear seems inevitable. The novelist mixes the sordid news and social fiction, pointing to the details of these lives thanks to his precise and chilling writing. His remarks is amplified, brushing the painting of an era through the journey of these types which were thinking more clever than the others.