Nicolas Freeling: Not as Far as Velma (USA 2023)

From the Publisher:
"That artful master of the international policier... delivers another one of his uncommonly intelligent procedurals with Inspector Henri Castang." -- The New York Times

When Police Commissaire Henri Castang is summoned to investigate a missing hotelier, he's not alarmed at the young widow's disappearance. Until a routine inquiry on the hotel's last guest reveals him to be a Jewish artist and concentration camp survivor who never checked in to a room. All clues seem to lead to a dead end, until a terrorist bombing of a church convent sends Castang in search of a mystery that will link back to the crimes buried deep in Europe's war-torn past.

"[A] rich and savory ratatouille fans have come to expect from Freeling-ironical and humorous, sad, clever and insightful." -- Publishers Weekly
"A dark vision of war then-and-now and of tangled loyalties-to God, to country, to man -- with love overriding all." -- Kirkus Reviews

Nicolas Freeling: Not as Far as Velma. A Henri Castang Mystery. Early Bird Books / Open Road Media, ISBN: 9781504090278 (December, 2023), eBook, 6435 KB (ca. 317 p.), $14.99.

Nicolas Freeling: Not as Far as Velma (2001)

From the Publisher:
A young widow goes missing. An old Polish Jewish artist turns up in a hotel register even though he has never set foot in the tiny hotel. A bomb is placed in a local convent, and a frightening sum of money is left in a Swiss bank account. Henri Castang investigates and is pulled into seething church politics in an ingenious and dramatic web of deception.

Nicolas Freeling: Not as Far as Velma. A Henri Castang Mystery. House of Stratus, ISBN: 1842328638 (June, 2001), 246 p., £6.99, $11.50.

Nicolas Freeling: Not as Far as Velma (USA 1990)

From the Publisher:
As Inspector Henri Castang takes on the case of the disappearance of middle-aged hotel-keeper Adrienne Sergent, he can't help thinking that it is an utterly routine one. After all, women vanish every day. But some interesting psychological features turn up... why would a woman with an aviary filled with rare songbirds not make some provision for their care?

Now a bomb has destroyed a local convent, killing two nuns and injuring a third. Mme. Sergent had done some charity work for the sisters. Is there a connection between her disappearance and the bombing?

The local bishop takes Castang into his confidence and points him (somewhat enigmatically) in a few directions. One of the leads is to a brilliant but erratic journalist who had spent some time in Central America -- very near where the now-dead nuns had been practicing a form of liberation theology.

In this evocative and moving novel, Nicolas Freeling offers a vivid vision of contemporary law and justice...
NOT AS FAR AS VELMA

"Read this book and you'll want to get all the Freelings in print. You're in the hands of a master." -- Cosmopolitan
"With Mr. Freeling, you just never know what to expect. Except satisfaction." -- New York Times Book Review

Cover design by Jackie Merri Meyer
Cover illustration by John Howard

Nicolas Freeling: Not as Far as Velma. Mysterious Press, ISBN: 0445408111 (May, 1990), 246 p., $4.95.