Haute-Garonne: The Toulouse of the Dark Years by Régis Tomàs
Professor of philosophy at Jean-Jaurès University, Régis Tomàs publishes his second book, “La part de l’ogre”. A mirror of the city of Toulouse subjected to the Occupation, and its very nebulous characters.
In 2019, Régis Tomàs, professor of philosophy at Jean-Jaurès University and the Catholic Institute and passionate about history, wrote his first novel, “Lives and Deaths of Marco Mariotti”, a dark thriller, Chicago version of the thirty. After a great success both critical and public, he renews the experience with “La part de l’ogre”. A detective and historical novel whose plot takes place in the summer of 1942, the first month of the German Occupation in the Pink City. “A book in which genres intertwine to form a sort of hooliganism. Without delving too much into the story, we can simply say: it is December 9, 1942. Pierre d’Eyquem, a Parisian inspector, arrives in Toulouse to elucidate the mysterious murders of two unknown women, each tortured and amputated with one leg. The disappearance of Geneviève Faure seems to relaunch the investigation. Is she the victim of the same killer or of her husband, a notable with perverse inclinations? Her SS lover or even the mobster Fernand Desambre quickly adds to the list of suspects.
A novel where the style resembles the tasty dialogues of Michel Audiard, which of course gives all the rhythm to the book. “It’s a thriller that can be described as both modern with short chapters and old with the “punch line”, in other words good words, in the style of Léo Malet and the shock detective Nestor Burma”.
“what interests me are the characters with multiple faces”
Régis Tomàs of course carried out a great deal of research, particularly on the daily life of this complex period: the main concern of the people of Toulouse being, of course, food: “I went through the newspapers of the time a lot, in particular the Dépêche du Midi, to retranslate both a fictional and historical side”. Why choose this period? “What interests me are the dangerous journeys of people who take on multiple characters. This historical moment lends itself particularly well. The more the events are complex, the more the human becomes multiple”. Following the example of the formidable bandit Pierre Loutrel, alias “Pierrot le fou”, passed from the Gestapo to the Resistance in Toulouse, recruited by the Morhange network to execute two militia leaders and who in 1944, will be decorated by the French Forces of the ‘Interior (FFI). This will be the subject of my next book.
Ed. Cairn, 11 €