The Cairo Diary

by: Maxim Chattam

Published by: St. Martin's

Reviewed by Kathy Perschmann

French thriller author Maxim Chattam has created a vastly intriguing tale within a tale in The Cairo Diary.

Marion, a single woman approaching middle age, is spirited out of Paris by the Secret Service, the DST. She has made some revelations, and has received threats, and until things settle down, she must be kept safe. She is taken to Mont-Saint-Michel, the picturesque tiny mountain of an island off the coast, and is put up in the abbey, with a handful of monks and nuns. She is not a religious person, particularly, and is a bit put off by some of her new neighbors.

Marion’s cover story is that she is stressed out and needs a retreat. She is given a small apartment in the abbey, and strolls through the town making friends with an older man, Joe, and a shopkeeper Beatrice and her son, Gregoire. Father Damien takes her to the nearby town of Avranches to work on cataloging and sorting some old books and periodicals.

There she stumbles across an old copy of a favorite Edgar Allen Poe book, The Narrative of A. Gordon Pym. She grabs it and takes it with her back to the Mont, as she is fluent in English, and discovers that it contains a handwritten diary from Cairo, dated 1928, written by Police Inspector Jeremy Matheson. Marion is someone who believes in the power and truth of words. She relishes her time with the book, and is distracted by an anonymous demand that she return it. She keeps it with her at all times, and feels that she is watched and followed. A bit of research shows that the incidents that Inspector Matheson was investigating, the tremendously brutal slayings of several children in Cairo, really did happen.

Marion is stunned at the conclusion of the diary. Who really was the murderer? What happened to the Inspector? Is there a scientific reason for the murderer’s appearance, or it really a monstrous ghul? Someone had left her a cryptic riddle when she first arrived, and she solved it and found a note. Is this same person still playing games with her? How did the diary get to the Mont-Saint-Michel archives? Who on the island feels that the book belongs to them? Marion reveals the real reason she is on the island to Beatrice- and immediately regrets it. Is her life in danger?

Armchair Interviews says: This finely constructed book composed of two tales will keep you spellbound. Be aware it strays just this side of being in the horror genre.