How's the Pain? is an off-kilter, blackly comic novel about an unlikely duo of a soon-to-be-retired assassin and a deadbeat young man, from the 'slyly funny' [Sunday Times] Pascal Garnier. 'Deliciously dark ... painfully funny' New York Times Death is Simon's business. And now the ageing vermin exterminator is preparing to die. But he still has one last job down on the coast, and he needs a driver. Bernard is twenty-one. He can drive and he's never seen the sea. He can't pass up the chance to chauffeur for Simon, whatever his mother may say. As the unlikely pair set off on their journey, Bernard soon finds that Simon's definition of vermin is broader than he'd expected ... Veering from the hilarious to the horrific, this offbeat story from master stylist Pascal Garnier is at heart an affecting study of human frailty.

Brice and Emma had bought their new home in the countryside together. And then Emma disappeared. Now, as he awaits her return, Brice busies himself with DIY and walks around the village. He gradually comes to know his new neighbours including Blanche, an enigmatic woman in white, who has lived on her own in the big house by the graveyard since the death of her father, to whom Brice bears a curious resemblance...

'Wonderful. . . properly noir' Ian Rankin 'Devastating and brilliant' Sunday Times 'Happiness for those unused to it is like food for the starving - a little too much can be fatal.' Writer Jeff Colombier is not accustomed to success. Twice divorced with a grown-up son he barely sees, he drinks too much and his books don't sell. Then he wins a big literary prize and his life changes for ever. Overwhelmed by his newfound wealth and happiness, he feels the need to escape and recapture his lost youth, taking his son, Damien, with him. And if shady lawyers and mysterious girls lead them down dangerous paths . . . well, c'est la vie. A twisted, trippy feat of French noir from 'the true heir to Simenon'.

At first it feels like a terrible mistake: they're the only residents and it's raining non-stop. Then three neighbours arrive, the sun comes out, and life becomes far more interesting and agreeable. Until, that is, some gypsies set up camp just outside their gated community -

Fabien and Sylvie had both known their marriage was no longer working. And yet when Sylvie is involved in a fatal car accident, her husband is stunned to discover that she had a lover who died alongside her. With thoughts of revenge on his mind, Fabien decides to find out about the lover's widow, Martine, first by stalking her, then by breaking into her home. He really needs to get Martine on her own. But she never goes anywhere without her formidable best friend, Madeleine ...

It's a few days before Christmas in Versailles. Olivier has come to bury his mother, but the impending holidays and icy conditions have delayed the funeral. While trapped in limbo at his mother's flat, a chance encounter brings Olivier back in touch with childhood friend Jeanne and her blind brother, Rodolphe. Rodolphe suggests they have dinner together, along with a homeless man he's taken in. As the wine flows, dark secrets are spilled, and there's more than just hangovers to deal with the next morning...

The future is on its way to Picardy with the construction of a huge motorway. But nearby is a house where nothing has changed since 1945. Traumatised by events that year, Yolande hasn't left her home since. And life has not been kinder to Bernard, her brother, who is now in the final months of a terminal illness. Realizing that he has so little time left, Bernard's gloom suddenly lifts. With no longer anything to lose, he becomes reckless - and murderous -

Recently widowed grandmother Eliette is returning to her house in the mountains when her car breaks down. A stranger offers help and Eliette gives him a lift, glad of the company and interruption to her routine. A tale of retirement and calm domesticity, with a hint of menace about to explode.

At least vultures have the decency to wait until their prey's dead before picking it apart ...After losing his wife and suffering a stroke, cantankerous retiree Edouard Lavenant has moved from Lyon to a village in the mountains with his put-upon nurse, Therese. One day, a man comes to the door claiming to be Edouard's long-lost son. Edouard's temper seems to be softening, but it isn't long before the local vultures are circling overhead ...

A crime author writing the story of Louis, who decides to do his cash-strapped friends a favor by hastening their parents' demise, finds reality and fiction overlapping during a stay in Normandy.Pascal Garnier combines the style of Simenon, the insight of Camus with a wit that is all his own.

Volume 1 includes How's the Pain?, the tale of an ageing `pest exterminator' taking on one last job on the French Riviera; The Panda Theory, in which a stranger, Gabriel, arrives in a Breton town and befriends the locals ... but is he as angelic as he seems?; and The A26, in which a new Picardy motorway brings modernity close to a flat in which a brother and sister live together, haunted by terminal illness and the events of 1945.

"You've only been here for a few days but you already know loads of people. You walk into people's lives, just like that." Gabriel is a stranger in a small Breton town. Nobody knows where he came from or why he's here. Yet his small acts of kindness, and exceptional cooking, quickly earn him acceptance from the locals. His new friends grow fond of Gabriel, who seems as reserved and benign as the toy panda he wins at the funfair. But unlike Gabriel, the fluffy toy is not haunted by his past...

'Shifting from psychological thriller to absurd road trip tinged with black humor, A Long Way Off is the odyssey of an anti-hero' France-Amerique 'Rich and abundant in dark comedy' Strong Words Magazine 'Masterly' John Banville 'Wonderful . . . properly noir' Ian Rankin Marc dreams of going somewhere far, far away - but he'll start by taking his cat and his grown-up daughter, Anne, to an out-of-season resort on the Channel. Reluctant to go home, the curious threesome head south for Agen, whose main claim to fame is its prunes. As their impromptu road trip takes ever stranger turns, the trail of destruction - and mysterious disappearances - mounts up in their wake. Shocking, hilarious and poignant, the final dose of French noir from Pascal Garnier, published shortly before his death, is the author on top form.

Written over a 15-year period from the mid '90s, Garnier's short novels weave a profound and darkly comic tapestry of human experience. Volume 2 includes Boxes, which tells the story of Brice, `the sole survivor of the natural disaster that at one time or another strikes us all, known as `moving house''; The Front Seat Passenger, in which a widower discovers his wife had a lover and decides to track down his widow; The Islanders, whose protagonist Olivier finds himself thrown back together with a childhood friend with whom he shares a dark secret; and Moon in a Dead Eye, in which the paranoia of the residents of a gated retirement village spins out of control.