After the independent novel Norferville (River Éditions) In 2024, author Franck Thilliez returns to his emblematic series Sharko and Henebelle with Delayed (After The flaw In 2023), a psychological thriller around mental health published by river editions.
Franck Sharko is again linked to a new complex survey in a story with the many characters who manages to develop a whole theme around psychological diseases and law. An exciting goldsmith’s work to follow and which does not prevent Franck Thilliez from delivering a new addictive story that is read in one go.
Éléonore Hourdel, a UMD doctor – units for difficult patients – welcomes a new patient in his establishment whose identity is unknown. Bloody and disoriented, recovered at the corner station after pushing a passerby, it seems to flee from demons and fears “Voices” that he hears. At the same time, in the Paris region, police commander Franck Sharko discovers a horrible murder: a man murdered during his sleep, whose body is filled with soda crystals.
With DelayedFranck Thilliez once again plunges into the meanders of humanity, in what is most sordid, while keeping mental illness and psychology as a line. Using the double (or triple) narration wisely, the book draws its strength from the writing of its author and from the development of its characters (known as the new ones), while creating bridges between the different intrigues. If certain coincidences may seem unlikely, they allow Franck Thilliez to focus entirely on his characters and on the themes he wishes to approach. The novel thus manages to emotionally touch the reader and to be authentic.
When the medical and the judiciary meet
By immersing the reader within a UMD, Franck Thilliez questions the lives of these patients on the sidelines of society. He himself documented himself at length by going to real centers to grasp the complexity and the particularities of these places. Delayed is instantly earth-to-terre. The book shows both great accessibility – the author never drowns the reader under too much complexity – while being particularly meticulous when it comes to placing the context surrounding these patients.
Often summarized to “Dangerous crazy”the men and women of these establishments live according to their own conscience. The author dwells on their journeys and their ills, without forgetting to speak of doctors, nurses, as well as working conditions in these centers deemed to be particularly difficult. Safety protocols, a daily life marked by unpredictability, opposition between a rigid and more open approach, chronic fatigue and lack of recognition … delay is intimately linked to the situation of the health sector in France. The author places himself just after the COVID’s health crisis, recalling the fragility of a long -proven system.
-Beyond the medical aspect, Franck Thilliez adds to his intrigue a legal theme. How to judge people severely affected by a psychiatric disease? Do they have legal responsibility? This very wide notion which also animates the debates of the judicial system in France nourishes the most complex events of the plot.
Franck Thilliez does not skimp when it comes to staging particularly horrible and violent acts, making the questioning around these most ambiguous subjects. The more odious the crime, the more the emotion takes the step and biases the purely legal questions.
Characters at the heart of the story
And Delayed has everything to fill the readers linked directly or indirectly to the medical or legal environment, the book also contains all the codes of the good thriller and the thriller, confirming the mastery of the writer in a genre he has been handling for years.
Delayed Thus allows you to find one of the most emblematic characters of the novelist’s bibliography, Franck Sharko, and once again develop his relationship to the profession, his experience and his gaze on the world around him. On the side of Éléonore Hourdel, the book embarks on a quest for identity marked by mysteries and secrets, as fluid as it is engaging.
If the Franck Thilliez style is now known and acted, Delayed Go as close as possible to human madness by passionately developing mental illness in the broad sense. By returning his intrigue from different points of view and approaches, the writer questions two pillars of French society: the medical and judicial institution.
Without ever losing sight of his characters, who remain at the heart of the story, he offers a dense intrigue that goes in unpredictable directions. Playful in horror and macabre, exciting in themes and words.
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