The Primitive Conjuration, the new novel by Maxime Chattam, is released today in bookstores. After a successful detour into fantasy with the Otherworld saga and the duo from the Time series set at the beginning of the 20th century, the author returns to a contemporary thriller that is as effective as it is terrifying. What if Evil gathered?
In the Paris region, several bodies are found bearing a mysterious engraved symbol: *e.
Yet what quickly becomes apparent to Alexis Timée (could he be a descendant of the hero of Léviatemps?) and his team is that there can only be one killer: too many differences in the modus operandi: women are found brutally tortured and raped, while other victims seem to have imploded from within.
Everything becomes more complicated when a teenager pushes four people under a train before taking his own life after tagging the same symbol on a station wall.
Everything accelerates when several murders are committed on the same night in different locations.
The killers seem to be responding to each other, challenging, playing. France is no longer enough, and the epidemic spreads: Spain, Scotland, Poland. Evil is gaining ground rapidly, the Research Section is on high alert, their goal: to contain this pandemic.
Quickly immersed in the story, the reader follows the investigation of Alexis, Ludivine, and Segnon, members of the SR brigade. The novel opens as crimes have already been committed, the investigation is underway but stalled. While summarizing the facts, the author introduces us to characters we inevitably grow attached to. Alexis is the central figure of the trio, an efficient thirty-something cop but plagued by loneliness, true loneliness, a real need to build a family; Ludivine, a pretty blonde the same age as Alexis, represents a modern and tenacious female figure, and finally Segnon, a tall black man devoted above all to his wife and children. Richard Mikelis, a retired profiler, joins the team. Extremely skilled at putting himself in the killer’s shoes, Mikelis frightens as much as he inspires admiration. All the characters are accurately described and human. They are heroes we want to follow without the slightest hesitation.
In this novel, it is clear that family is the cornerstone that keeps the characters grounded in daily reality and prevents them from falling into darkness; it is the element that protects them and brings a certain tenderness to the entire novel.
Written in the third person and divided into three large parts (Him, Her, Them), the plot is masterfully constructed, sowing confusion and anxiety in the reader, the suspense building up quickly and escalating. Until the penultimate chapter, Maxime Chattam maintains a very high level of uncertainty about the fate of the heroes. Terribly Machiavellian, The Primitive Conjuration doesn’t just present a psychopathic killer but a multitude, leading to the final revelation that will chill more than one reader! The ending is thrilling, burning, one is completely immersed in it, stuck with Ludivine, waiting for dawn to break…
As is typical in Maxime Chattam’s novels, the writing is meticulous, fluid, and dense, informative without ever being too difficult to understand. Very descriptive, it’s easy to visualize the places, the characters building a world around the detective plot that enriches the novel. Fans will appreciate a nod from the author in the last pages and will meet again, with emotion, a character that “the Chattamists” could not forget.
460 pages of terror, investigation, an infernal dive into the depths of the human being. Addressing the theme of primitive reflexes in man, Maxime Chattam offers us a powerful thriller, full of reflection, an intense crossover between The Soul of Evil and The Gaia Theory. The Primitive Conjuration is a novel with relentless suspense where the author crosses a new threshold in the darkness of the human soul.
