Louise Penny

View Reviews of books by Louise Penny

Countdown with ...

Louise Penny

Louise Penny is the author of the Chief Inspector Gamache novels, set in her native Quebec, Canada. She was a journalist with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and was well into her 40s before Still Life, the first in the series, was published.

The books have won international awards including the UK John Creasey Dagger, the US Anthony and Agatha awards, and the Canadian Arthur Ellis.  She’s been awarded two Honorary Doctorates as well as the Order of Canada and the Ordre National du Quebec for her contributions to Canadian literature and her work on behalf of literacy, Alzheimer’s and dementia, which took her husband Michael.

She lives with her dog Bishop in a village south of Montreal, and has homes in New York City and London.

Interviewed 19 August 2017

Ten words to sum up your working life to date ...

Surprising, scary, noli timere, coffee, gummy bears, blessed, discipline, grateful.

Nine things you can see from where you're sitting ...

Fireplace, dog, old pine table, laptop, flowers, notebook, coffee mug, bookcases and forest.

Eight minutes to prepare a meal. What's it going to be ?

Steak on the BBQ.

Seven people you'd like to go for a drink with ...

Helen Keller, Eleanor Roosevelt, Hillary Clinton, Peter Ustinov, Justin Trudeau (can it be a date?) Pope Francis (perhaps not a date), Romeo Dallaire.

Six things you can't live without ...

Books, notebook and pen, Nespresso machine, laptop, Netflix.

Five favourite words ...

Anaesthesiologists. Plump. Merde. Gummy Bears

Four places you'd run away to ...

London, New York, cottage by a lake, my bath.

Three books you've bought recently ...

Books for Living by Will Schwalbe
The Undoing Project by Michael Lewis
Cold Earth by Ann Cleeves

Two things that make you rant ...

People who cut into line, the American president.

One thing you'd tell your teenage self ...

You will find love.