Cuisine Americaine

Cuisine Americaine is the story of five people who meet on a writer’s retreat in France. Germaine is in her mid fifties and is the caretaker for whom the retreat is a roof over her head. Helmut, thirty-something, is a Swedish detective writer, only partly successful, whose agent is encouraging him to broaden the scope of his detective fiction. He has come on the retreat to get away from a stressful family life. Arthur, originally from France but living in Germany, is a poet who has been married three times. Now in his forties, is in straightened financial circumstances, he is looking for a woman to help him out. Svetlana, a poet from Ukraine, is, at eighteen, the youngest. Svetlana is fed up with her life back home and is seeking adventure as well as fame and fortune. Katherine is from Scotland and in her early fifties. She dreams of being a writer and settling in France. When the five head to Paris for a break one of their number disappears. As the remaining four begin their search for the missing they all begin to suspect one another by turns and each is forced to reveal rather more about themselves and their dubious pasts than they intended.
A year later the writers return to the retreat for a reunion when, again, the unexpected happens and all again are under suspicion.
A tale with lots of twists, ‘Cuisine Americaine’ is a humourous take on the mystery novel. It is also a more serious examination of the disparate motives of friends and the development of friendship and its converse – enmity.