Maigret and the Minister (Inspector Maigret)

When an explosive government report goes missing, Maigret must track it down before an honest man takes the fall.

When a government minister telephones Maigret directly, the inspector senses trouble. Auguste Point is not accused of murder, theft, or fraud, but of knowing too much. A devastating disaster at a children’s sanatorium has reopened old political wounds, and a long-suppressed engineering report threatens to bring down reputations, careers, and even the government itself—or it would, if it hadn’t just gone missing. Wary of entering the murky world of politics, Maigret nevertheless agrees to investigate. Shuttling between ministerial offices and engineering schools, Parisian salons and Brussels hotels, Maigret gradually exposes a web of influence that extends far beyond any single culprit.

One of Georges Simenon’s most overtly political Maigret novels, Maigret and the Minister delves into the morass of self-interest and betrayal that underpins a seemingly well-functioning bureaucracy. Lucid and disquieting, it finds Maigret confronting faceless powers that can’t be arrested—and asking whether truth even matters when responsibility is everywhere and nowhere at once.