The purple rivers (novel)

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The purple rivers (original title: Les Rivières pourpres , 1997) is a novel by the French writer and journalist Jean-Christophe Grangé , which was filmed in 2000 under the same title .

content

The detective Pierre Niémans beats a hooligan ready for hospital. Only an accidental cell phone call from his boss saves this little thug's life. Pierre is assigned to leave his desk - to which he was "promoted" due to his violence - and to investigate a murder case. The 25-year-old librarian Rémy Caillois was brutally tortured and then strangled. Pierre goes to the provinces and meets Fanny Ferreira, a very young professor who found the body during a kayak tour in the mountains. During the autopsy it turns out that the eyes of the corpse have been removed and the orbit has been filled with "acid" water. An environmental activist draws Pierre's attention to the acid rain that fell many years ago. As a result, the scene of the crime is certain for him: The crime must have taken place on the glacier , because old rain is truly preserved there. Together with the experienced Fanny Ferreira, he visits the glacier and finds another body. This victim was also strangled and mutilated. This was Philippe Sertys, who worked in a clinic. Like Remy, he had the same job as his father, so they were the second generation of librarians and carers. The investigation led Eric Joisneau, an employee of Pierre, to the ophthalmologist Edmond Chernecé. He kills Eric to protect himself. Pierre goes in search of his missing colleague and also questions this doctor. At first he has no suspicions, but when fragments of glass are found in the eyes of the second corpse, he suspects this medic as the next victim. But Pierre comes too late: the doctor was murdered. In his clinic he also finds the body of his colleague. Pierre finds out that Philippe Sertys inherited a warehouse from his father. When he examines it, it is empty, but he finds a small notebook with the following lines: “We are the new masters, we are the slaves . We are everywhere, we are nowhere. We are the surveyors , we rule the Crimson Rivers ”.

At the same time, the young police officer Karim Abdouf is investigating a grave desecration in another district. Somebody broke into the crypt of a little boy named Jude Itéro. His boss Henri Crozier suspects that this was an act by right-wing extremists. Karim makes his way to them and beats the information out of them. But they have nothing to do with the act. Karim continues investigating and finds out that all school records and also all photographs of this child who died 14 years ago were stolen. He first suspects that this was caused by the grave robbers . But this is not the case. A nun named Andrée had stolen the pictures many years ago. With the reference to “ circus ” he gets on the track that the child named Jude Itéro is a girl. Karim rightly suspects that the teacher may have played a role in this deception. She accepted the position under her maiden name Pascaud, but was actually called Hérault. It is clear to Karim that the girl's real name is Judith Hérault - a name that sounds the same in French as Jude Itéro. He looks into the child's file; it actually died in a traffic accident. In this case, the corpse was so torn that the sex of the child could no longer be determined. However, the body was identified with a fingerprint. A Lada was seen by the skinheads during the desecration of the grave . Investigations reveal that this was Philippe Sertys' car.

The two cops Karim and Pierre meet and investigate their common case. They find that the motive is revenge. The three murder victims exchanged newborns to replenish the genetic makeup of the intellectual university enclave that had to contend with the effects of inbreeding . The exchange was the job of Philippe Sertys. Rémy's job was to control the seating arrangements for the students in the library so that the “gene” -right couples could regularly “meet / fall in love / get married / have children”. The two inherited this task from their fathers. The doctor came in later. But they didn't just exchange children - they usually also killed the weak professor's children.

Their fathers also wanted to exchange the newborn Héraults. But they weren't expecting twins. They exchanged as planned with a baby, the feeble intellectual child was killed. The birth parents went home with their Judith, their twin sister Fanny was raised by professors. Since the Héraults lived far away, there was initially no danger. But the mother was transferred to the Guernon School as a teacher. And so Judith and Fanny came into the same class, where the similarity was of course noticeable. The biological father wanted to clarify the facts, but was murdered, the murder disguised as a traffic accident. Judith and her mother fled to Sarzac, the girl masquerading as a boy. But they realized that they would be found - and so the mother decided on a desperate plan. With the help of the nun Andrée she had all photos removed and staged a traffic accident in which Jude / Judith allegedly died. For this purpose, she used the body of another traffic accident victim. So that this corpse could be identified as her child, she simply severed a finger joint from her daughter and pushed it under the torn corpse.

Judith came to Fanny. Both girls shared an existence . When they found clues for the perpetrators, they decided to take revenge. And they brutally murdered the three men one after the other, consciously robbing them of their eyes and draping the corpses so that their reflection in the mirror would be seen first. They didn't just want to kill them, they wanted to rob them of their identities - just as they had stolen the identities of innocent children.

Karim's boss Henri Crozier was also implicated in the deception. Karim uses this to find the mother of the two girls, from whom he receives a photo of the twins . When he shows the photo to Pierre, of course, the police immediately know who the murderers are. This is particularly bad for Pierre because he has just started an affair with Fanny.

Fanny stabs Pierre to death at the showdown . But he could still shoot her. Both die, Pierre at least escapes the shame of a murder charge in this way: The hooligan from the beginning of the story died from his beatings. Judith is subsequently shot by Karim. He then realizes that he fell in love with this girl in the course of the investigation. The novel closes with the words " The darkness that held his heart could not penetrate the sun ".

Acting persons

  • Pierre Niemans: hard cop, former star of the RAID , former Commissioner of the BRB, former murderers and Dealer Hunter - with an urge to violence, with a weakness - he has a dog phobia
  • Antoine Rheims: Pierre Niemans head of the central office
  • Eric Joisneau: Grenoble Criminal Police - dropped out of law school in Guernon to become a police officer
  • Rémy Caillois: murder victim, 25 years old, chief librarian at the University of Guernon, his tortured body was found in a crevice
  • Sophie Caillois: Remy's wife
  • Captain Roger Barnes: Chief of the Guernon Gendarmerie
  • Bernhard Terpentes: examining magistrate
  • Fanny Ferreira: Professor, Sportswoman
  • Vincent Luyse: the rector of the university
  • Marc Costes: coroner
  • Karim Abdouf: former criminal , murderer - now a provincial policeman in Sarzac, was punk , finished his law studies at the age of 21 , taciturn martial artist , loner
  • Henry Crozier: Karim's boss
  • Jude Itéro: his grave was desecrated by unknown persons
  • Judith Hérault: Fanny's twin sister, aka Jude Itéro
  • Sister Andrée: nun, Fabienne's helper
  • Philippe Sertys: the second murder victim, assistant nurse at the Guernon hospital
  • Fabienne Hérault (nee Pascaud): the mother of Fanny and Judith
  • Sylvain Hérault: Fabienne's husband and father of Fanny and Judith
  • Dr. Edmond Chernecé: Ophthalmologist

expenditure

  • Jean-Christophe Grangé: The purple rivers. Thriller ("Les rivières pourpres"). New edition Bechtermünz Verlag, Augsburg 2001, ISBN 3-8289-0436-X (translated by Barbara Schaden).
  • Jean-Christophe Grangé: Les rivières pourpres . Michel, Paris 2000, ISBN 978-2-226-12034-2 .
  • Jean-Christophe Grangé: The purple rivers. Audio book . Abridged version. Lübbe Audio, Bergisch Gladbach 2006, ISBN 978-3-404-77076-2 (6 CDs, read by Joachim Kerzel ).